Just a day after the Nepalese media revealed about the close nexus and recent secret meetings between the two Red brothers (Maoists) from Nepal and India in an undisclosed location in India, a senior leader of Unified Communist Party of Nepal-Maoists (UCPN-M) has openly admitted that his party has extended full cooperation and support with Indian Maoists.
Speaking at press meeting, a Maoists-affiliated journalists’ association in Bara district of central Terai, party secretary CP Gajurel said, “We have extended our total support to the Indian Maoists Party, which has been enlisted as terrorist outfit by the Indian government, for their ongoing armed movement.”
According to a report carried out by the Rajdhani Daily, a Nepali national daily in Nepal, Gajurel, however, did not elaborate on whether their support was just a moral one or with arms as speculated by the Indian Home Minister P Chidambaram, recently.
The former chief of former rebels’ foreign relation bureau Gajurel who had spent three years jail term in Chennai a few years ago, is the first Maoists leader who applauded the Indian Maoists’ armed insurgency publicly.
Two days ago, the Rajdhani Daily had revealed about the secrete meeting held between the UCPN-M team led by central committee member Indra Mohal Sigdel alias Basanta and Indian Maoists leader Kishanji in an undisclosed place in India while Sigdel was in four-day India tour from October 8 to 11.
Meanwhile, the Maoists leaders and cadres launched their scheduled protest program of picketing the offices of local bodies-village development committee and municipalities- across the country.
Though the Maoists protests was largely peaceful it affected the normal life as it paralyzed the daily services that have to be delivered by the concerned offices.
In another political development, Maoists chairman Pushpa Kamal Dahal, alias Prachanda, held meeting with Nepali Congress President and former Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala at the latter’s residence.
According to a source close to Koirala, Koirala urged the Maoists supremo to call off the protest programme and sit for a dialogue. He also urged Prachanda to let the Parliament session that has been obstructed by them for the last three months and allow the government to endorse its fiscal budget.
In response, Prachanda said the ruling coalition partners should allow the Maoists to take up the most controversial resolution regarding the “so-called” unconstitutional move carried out by the President Dr Ram Baran Yadav on May 3 by retaining the sacked chief of army staff Rookmangud Katawal.
Meanwhile, Nepalese Finance Minister Surendra Panday has said the government was not in condition to provide monthly salary and perks to government officials and parliamentarians, including the prisoners from mid-November.
