Nepal slips back to medieval rule

The King of Nepal has just seized absolute power, sacked the entire Government and put the country's Prime Minister under house arrest.

Every telephone line, internet connection and mobile phone has been cut by royal decree, people flock in their droves to the capital Kathmandu to escape a Maoist insurgency, and the rebels can bring the capital to a near standstill by calling a general strike.

And yet, golfers can still be seen on the course outside Kathmandu airport, flights are beginning to arrive again from the outside world, and the tourist bazaars of the capital's Thamel quarter are doing their usual roaring trade in Buddhist devil masks and T-shirts.

Nepal might be in crisis, but for its citizens, this is nothing new. The last few years have been one long crisis.

What's happening now is nothing in a country where, 3 1/2 years ago, almost the entire royal family was wiped out, apparently after the then crown prince went on a berserk shooting rampage through the palace.

King Gyanendra's move to seize power this week is just the latest episode in the long agony of Nepal. "People are angry about what has happened. They are not happy," said Resam Gurung, an ex-soldier working as a watchman. "I don't want an absolute monarchy, I want to live freely."

But not everyone in Kathmandu agrees. "Look, what we want is peace," said Suwoj, a bookseller in Thamel Mall, where the trekkers and backpackers hang out. "Now the King can act decisively. The Prime Minister couldn't do anything. But now the King can bring peace with the Maoists."

Gyanendra's palace coup may have caught the attention - and earned the condemnation - of the outside world, but for many Nepalese it is less important than the Maoist insurgency that has killed more than 10,000 people. The Maoists already control huge areas of rural Nepal. Their reach extends even to Kathmandu, where people are scared enough to obey their commands for general strikes.

The strikes and blockades are crippling. Although very few tourists have faced any danger from the rebels, thousands have been scared away and the vital tourism economy is suffering.

Entire villages are kidnapped at gunpoint for "re-education" by the rebels. Villagers are trapped between the Maoists and the equally ruthless Army, and human rights have been trampled underfoot.

Britain, the US and India have all condemned the King for undermining democracy, but democracy was in trouble here a long time ago.

A trip to the Parliament building in Kathmandu is all you need to see what the King thinks of democracy. Soldiers guard the empty building. There is razor wire across the entrance.

Sher Bahadur Deuba, the Prime Minister placed under house arrest, was not elected. He and his Government were appointed by Gyanendra.

Take a trip to the headquarters of Congress, Nepal's biggest political party, and you get a fuller picture.

"You can't see anyone," said the doorman. "They've all been arrested."

Only leading politicians have been placed under house arrest. The rank and file have been carted off to prison. The Army came here four times, said the doorman, and 42 party members were arrested. Two have escaped, and are said to have fled to India.

"It's not right what the King has done in this situation," said the doorman, in the manner of a man who can no longer speak his mind without fear.

However, the sacking of the unpopular Deuba Government is nothing compared to the King's declaration of a state of emergency, which has prompted the worst assault on human rights in Nepal's recent history. The people have had their most basic human rights taken away.

With his newly restored medieval powers, Gyanendra has "suspended" not only the right to free speech, but freedom of thought in Nepal. He has subjected Nepal's press to strict censorship. The papers carried fawning accounts of the King's power grab.

The King "suspended" the right to assemble peacefully, and the right to privacy. He also, according to the Kathmandu Post, suspended the right to own private property.

Most of these rights have long been abused by the military and the Maoists. But this week Gyanendra took it a step further. He said no Nepalese citizen could even claim he had those rights any more.

In a joint statement Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the International Commission of Jurists said: "Nepal's last state of emergency in 2001-2002 had led to an explosion of serious human rights violations, including increased extra-judicial killings, enforced disappearances, arbitrary detention, and a breakdown in the rule of law." The new state of emergency, the human rights groups said, put "the Nepalese people at even greater risk of gross human rights abuses".

- INDEPENDENT