NC AND UML NOW SAY NO REASON TO ANNOUNCE ELECTION DATE Kathmandu, 22 May: A meeting of NC and UML decided Wednesday there’s no point in announcing official date for constituent assembly elections until political appoints of the Baburam Bhattarai government are overturned. The parties also decided to covey their stance to the Chairman of the Interim Election Council Khil Raj Regmi. The pressure on the government comes as dates were being after government chief’s discussions with party leaders. Nnnn PETROL PUMPS IN EAST FORCIBLY CLOSED DOWN Kathmandu, 22 May: Nearly 100 petrol pumps in the east have been forcibly closed by workers for nearly four days. They allege past agreements haven’t been met by government,. The closure that continued Wednesday has inconvenienced people. nnnn UNIDENTIFIED GROUP TORCHES SCHOOL IN TEHRATHUM Kathmandu, 22 May: Fire broke out at the Nabin Shikshya Sadan Higher Secondary School at Chhathar Phakchamara VDC here last night, destroying property worth 3.5 million rupees, RSS reports from Tehrathum.. An unidentified group is said to have set the school block on fire. The two-story block with four rooms was gutted by fire, said Krishna Bahadur Niraula, the Principal. It is not known who set the school on fire and the motive for that. Nnnn LEOPARD TERROR IN NEIGHBOURING BHAKTAPUR Kathmandu, 22 May:: Sirutar village in Bhaktapur district is under a grip of leopard terror these days, RSS reports from Bhaktapur.. Locals are facing problem going about their daily activities especially in the early morning and late evening due to the fear of attack by leopard. Farmers are panicky working out in the fields during the daytime also. This situation has arisen after a pair of leopard that entered the village nearly a week ago started killing dogs, and calves almost daily. It is said that the leopards pay an unwelcome door-to-door visit at houses at night, looking for prey. This has alarmed the locals and they have started searching for the wild beasts in groups. The leopards started roaming the village at night after locals in the adjoining Tikathali village last week killed a leopard that entered a house there. Nnnn NORTH KOREAN SPECIAL ENVOY IN CHINA Kathmandu, 22 May: A "special envoy" for North Korean leader Kim Jong Un left Pyongyang on Wednesday for China, the North's only major political and economic benefactor. State media released few details, but the trip comes at a rocky time in ties between the allies, AP reports from Pyongyang.. In a short dispatch, the North's official Korean Central News Agency said Kim's envoy was Choe Ryong Hae, the North Korean military's top political officer tasked with supervising the army. Choe was one of a handful of new vice marshals North Korea announced last year. The trip comes as a new leadership in China has shown frustration with North Korea and a greater willingness to work with Washington to harry Pyongyang over its nuclear ambitions. China is Pyongyang's economic and diplomatic lifeline, providing nearly all of its fuel and most of its trade. Still, Beijing's primary goal is stability, and it has sought to temper diplomatic pressure on the North's nuclear program so as not to create a crisis that could damage the Chinese economy or push refugees into China. South Korean Unification Ministry spokeswoman Park Soo-jin said it's too early to provide an assessment on Choe's trip to China. Kim Jong Un hasn't visited Beijing since he took power from his father, Kim Jong Il, who visited China in August 2011 just months before he died that December. Strains have increasingly appeared in relations between Beijing and Pyongyang over North Korea's nuclear efforts, which included a February nuclear test, Pyongyang's third. That test was followed by U.N. sanctions and a weekslong period of high tensions, as North Korea threatened nuclear strikes on Washington and Seoul. Those tensions have eased some, and there have been tentative signs of an interest in diplomacy. In another sign of Beijing's displeasure with its ally, China's state-run Bank of China Ltd. said earlier this month that it had notified the Foreign Trade Bank of North Korea that its accounts were closed and all financial transactions suspended. Washington welcomed the move. On Tuesday, a Chinese fisherman said gunmen wearing North Korean military uniforms released his boat after holding its crew for two weeks, beating up the captain and stealing the vessel's fuel. nnnn