THT 10 years ago: Rallies hail historic accord

Jhapa, November 9, 2006

The district units of seven-party alliance partners and Maoists throughout the country today organised rallies to celebrate the signing of the historic agreement between the political parties and the Maoists on Wednesday.

CPN-Maoist Jhapa district committee organised a rally to hail the historic agreement. Addressing an assembly held after the rally, president of Nepali Congress, Jhapa, Sudhir Siwakoti said Maoists should divert their attention towards nation building now.

He urged Maoists to come into healthy political competition. CPN-UML district secretary, Devendra Dahal said the present victory was only partial. CPN-Maoist district in charge, Apar, and Mechi-Koshi in charge, Meena, also addressed the gathering.

A report from Kavre said, eight political parties including Maoists staged a rally in Dhulikhel today to welcome the success of the peace talks.

The rally that started from the bus park went around various parts of the city and converged into a corner assembly at Saraswati Chowk. Some 300 school children also attended the gathering.

President of NC (D) city committee, Sameer Byanju, district chairperson of ANNISU-R, DM Lama, Raghujeet Shrestha of Nepali Congress, Prabhu Krishna Shrestha of Jana Morcha Nepal addressed the gathering.

A report from Bara said Maoists took out victory rallies to welcome the success of the peace talks in the rural areas.

Australia keen on stronger ties

These are exciting times for the burgeoning ties between Australia and Nepal, if the sheer number of Nepali students opting to study in Australia is any indication, that has gone up by over 140 per cent.

Now that peace finally has been brokered in our time, like most other stake holders and well-wishers of Nepal, Australia feels only better things are likely to follow.

In an exclusive interview with The Himalayan Times, Graeme Lade, Australian ambassador to Nepal, hoped that this would only strengthen investor interest in Nepal and smoothen the development process.

The Australian government has been extending developmental support to Nepal for over 40 years now. With the changing nature of global trade and development models, Nepal has attracted the Australian private sector as well.

Lade put forth the example of Snow Mountain Engineering Corporation (SMEC), one of the biggest Australian engineering firms, which has been working close to 14 years now to set up a 750 megawatt (MW) hydro power project in far western Nepal on the west Seti river.

Interestingly, India and China are the other involved parties in this project. While SMEC is the project coordinator as well as in charge of design, China is to build the dam.

India, on the other hand, will be laying power cables and the distribution infrastructure.