Nepal: Maoists Threaten to Resume People’s War
Posted by n3wday on June 12, 2009
This article was sent out on the Maoist Revolution E-list.
Maoists warn to resume people’s war
Kantipur Report
KATHMANDU, June 8 – The Unified CPN (Maoist) on Monday staged a mass movement in Banepa of Kavre district, on Monday, and warned to return to the people’s war. They staged the rally in protest against Sunday’s clashes in which its cadres were beaten up and offices were vandalised.
The rally of Maoist supporters who gathered from the nearby villages marched around the town of Banepa , 26 kilometers from the capital, and converged into a corner meeting at Chandani Chowk where the Maoist party office is situated.
Speaking at the rally, the Maoist leaders not only warned that they would return to the civil war but also said that those who dare to attack Maoists would not be spared. They claimed that the Maoist cadres have their weapons in their own house and not stored in UN-monitored cantonments.
“We have already measured the size of the hands of those who attacked our cadres and vandalised our offices,” said Maoist leader Chakra Bahadur Thapa ‘Sagar’.
Another leader said that their retaliation would extremely violent and the current government would be responsible for its consequences.
The demonstrating Maoists loudly chanted slogans against the Nepali Congress and the CPN-UML.
The local administration had to clamp curfew in Banepa yesterday after the clash between the town residents and the Maoists turned violent during the banda called by the Maoist affiliated Tamang Rastriya Mukti Morcha.
Also today, Maoist cadres who reached Banepa to take part in the rally damaged the UML District Office by pelting stones.
Revolution in South Asia 
kjose said
New Delhi, June 13: Nepali Maoists are proving a little more tractable for New Delhi than home-grown ones waging violent rebellion in the heartland.
Ahead of a crucial politburo meeting beginning Monday, India is believed to have conveyed to the Nepali Maoist leadership that it will find it tough to deal with them if they continue with their anti-India tirade.
What’s more important, the Maoists have taken note. A top Maoist leader has been quoted in the Kathmandu media as saying: “We made mistakes in handling India, but India also can’t ignore that we are the most powerful party here.”
This is a significant shift in the Maoist position, which has been at a shrill anti-India pitch ever since Prachanda quit as Prime Minister in the first week of May. Prachanda and other top Maoist leaders like Baburam Bhattarai have since directly blamed India for interfering in the internal affairs of Nepal and destabilising the country’s first Maoist-led government.
There are clear indications now that the Maoists themselves feel they need to tone down the anti-India rhetoric; their sense is that without negotiating with India, they cannot hope to be playing a central role in Nepali politics.
On its part, New Delhi, an oft-overt-oft-covert player in Nepal, is believed to have conveyed its deep annoyance with the sustained anti-India posture of the Maoists and made it known that “meaningful engagement” with them will be difficult if they do not effect urgent “course correction”.
New Delhi, which played a central role in brokering the peace process which brought the Maoists into mainstream electoral politics, and then into power last year, has more issues with Prachanda and his comrades than just their recent anti-India campaign.
India is not entirely convinced about the Maoists’ commitment to multiparty democracy and sections of the diplomatic-security establishment also suspect that the eventual Maoist ambition is to capture the Nepali state by force and establish a “people’s dictatorship”.
Some of those suspicions lay revealed when India scrambled to prevent Nepal Army chief Rukumangat Katawal from being sacked by Prachanda; South Block feared that General Katawal’s removal was the first step to the Maoists taking over control of Nepal’s armed forces. It was over Katawal’s removal that Prachanda had to quit.
New Delhi now wants that Nepal’s Maoists make a clear and unconditional commitment to multiparty democracy, which South Block believes was not entirely visible during their nine-month stint in power.
As one foreign office official engaged with Nepal put it: “They (the Maoists) have to give up dreams of capturing the state.”New Delhi doesn’t believe Prachanda entirely when he argues that his statements on consolidating Maoist hold over Nepal are mostly made under pressure from hardliners in the party and are meant for their consumption alone. It is also suggesting that one way the Maoists can demonstrate their commitment to multiparty democracy is to dismantle the Young Communist League, the apparatchik arm of the Maoists who have spread out across the country and often behave as strong-arm vigilantes.
India has also been concerned about the Maoists using the “China card” against India; indeed South Block took a dim view of the Maoist call to overhaul the “special relationship with India”, even as they cosied up to Beijing.Sources said India had conveyed to the Maoist leadership “in no uncertain terms” that its anti-India brand of Nepali nationalism will make things “politically more complicated and adverse” for them; the hint, quite clearly, is that India is free to use its leverage with other mainstream political parties like the Nepali Congress and the United Marxist Leninists (UML) to outflank the Maoists.
The accession of UML leader Madhav Nepal as successor to Prachanda — Nepal was helped into office through coalition talks facilitated by New Delhi — is probably an unfolding translation of the Indian message to the Maoists. And as they prepare for their politburo, Maoist bosses must ponder how they wish to respond.