Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
03KATHMANDU351
2003-02-27 10:04:00
UNCLASSIFIED
Embassy Kathmandu
Cable title:  

USG HUMAN RIGHTS STRATEGY FOR NEPAL

Tags:  PHUM PREL EAID NP 
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UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 KATHMANDU 000351 

SIPDIS

STATE FOR DRL
CORRECTED COPY OF KATHMANDU 0329 - TEXT MODIFIED

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PHUM PREL EAID NP
SUBJECT: USG HUMAN RIGHTS STRATEGY FOR NEPAL

REF: STATE 13790

---------
SUMMARY
---------

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 KATHMANDU 000351

SIPDIS

STATE FOR DRL
CORRECTED COPY OF KATHMANDU 0329 - TEXT MODIFIED

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PHUM PREL EAID NP
SUBJECT: USG HUMAN RIGHTS STRATEGY FOR NEPAL

REF: STATE 13790

--------------
SUMMARY
--------------


1. In CY 02 our Mission engaged with the Government of Nepal
(GON),the military, and members of civil society on a
variety of fronts to advance the USG human rights agenda.
Such programs have addressed needs in areas as diverse as
voter education; advocacy in a democracy; trafficking in
persons; child labor; civic education; women's political
participation; press freedom; rehabilitation of torture
victims; the Law of Armed Conflict; and the investigation of
human rights abuses by the military. End summary.


--------------
STRENGTHENING DEMOCRACY/
WOMEN'S RIGHTS
--------------


2. To address Nepal's weak democratic institutions, our
USAID Mission has worked with the host government, civil
society and American NGOs to bolster support for free and
fair elections. A two-year voter education program, funded
at USD 609,696, trained 180 district election officials and
1,227 civic/political leaders from 30 districts in proper
election procedures. The program also printed and
distributed 50,000 voter awareness booklets with pertinent
election laws and 70,000 voters' resource manuals. In
addition, 30 episodes of a radio drama on voters' rights and
responsibilities were aired in 10 local languages. As a
result, district election officials, local political party
and civic leaders, as well as general voters, benefited from
increased awareness of election procedures.



3. To help support an expanded role for women in the
electoral process, the USAID Mission has funded a two-year
program (begun in late FY 01) in increase women's political
participation by preparing approximately 4,000 female
candidates for upcoming local body elections. To date USD
628,304 has been obligated in this program. After local
elections were postponed in mid-2002, implementing partners
adapted the program to focus on preparing training materials,
surveying women leaders to identify potential candidates, and
conducting a needs assessment of 400 local female
representatives. Public Diplomacy (PD) also conducted a
series of workshops on women's empowerment in various
locations across the country, including some focused on
women's participation in the media.


4. During CY 2002 the USAID Mission continued a cooperative
agreement, begun in FY 01, to strengthen advocacy and local
government accountability. To date USD 689,070 has been
obligated. This program aims to achieve strengthened
capacity of federations/coalitions of natural resource user
groups and women's groups to advocate for member interests
and increased scrutiny of government performance in the
allocation and management of funds for local development. To
date, 366 lead group members have been trained, who have in
turn trained another 593 members of forest and irrigation
users' groups and women's groups. The women's coalitions
have engaged in advocacy campaigns on a wide variety of
issues, including the dowry system; leadership training;
employment conditions for women in hotels and restaurants;
reservation of 25 percent of local government budgets for
women's development; and combating witchcraft accusations.
USAID has signed a second cooperative agreement for a similar
three-year program, funded at USD 750,000, that will expand
this program to additional districts in mid-western and
far-western regions of the country.


5. To increase awareness of citizens' rights and
responsibilities in Nepal's relatively young democracy, the
PD section sponsored a program to develop a civic education
curriculum for schools in at least 15 districts. The
curriculum has been so successfully received that the
Ministry of Education plans to implement its use in grades
10-12 and has asked for complementary materials for use at
the primary school level. In CY 02 USD 164,451 was spent on
this program.



6. In March PD sponsored a lecture program on "The
Individual Citizen and Democracy: Rights and
Responsibilities." In June PD sponsored two seminars for
members of civil society, the government, and the judiciary
on "The Difference Between Human Rights and Citizens' Rights"
and "Human Rights and the Rule of Law" in Kathmandu and
Pokhara respectively.

--------------
ANTI-TRAFFICKING/
CHILD LABOR
--------------


7. In FY 01-02 the Mission supported anti-trafficking
programs that included training for local government
anti-trafficking task forces, overseas employment agency
rights training, dissemination of information on safe
migration, psycho-social counseling, and anti-trafficking
network strengthening. To date USD 900,000 has been
obligated for these activities. Participants included
vulnerable women and girls, teachers and students, staff of
transit homes for returning victims of trafficking, members
of local government and transport workers. USAID-funded
programs also reviewed the SAARC Convention on Preventing and
Combating Trafficking of Women and Children for Prostitution
from a human rights perspective, as well as a study of
Nepal's labor and migration laws in the context of
trafficking and women's right to migrate. The latter study
found that restrictions on women's overseas employment in
fact made it more likely that women would resort to illegal
migration, thus making them more vulnerable to being
trafficked. (Note: Legal restrictions on women's right to
travel to the Gulf for employment have since been lifted.
End note.) In CY 02 the Mission also funded a program
through UNICEF to provide computer equipment and to design a
database for police units specifically charged with
controlling trafficking.


8. The USG Department of Labor has committed USD 5 million
for a comprehensive, three-year, "time-bound" program to
eliminate the worst forms of child labor. This program is
being implemented through the ILO and the NGO World
Education.

-------------- --
HUMAN RIGHTS IN THE CONTEXT OF THE INSURGENCY
-------------- --


9. For the past seven years, Nepal has been gripped by a
violent domestic Maoist insurgency in which nearly 7,000
people have been killed. After the Maoists unilaterally
broke a ceasefire with a series of attacks on the security
forces in November 2001, King Gyanendra, on the advice of the
Prime Minister, mobilized the Royal Nepal Army (RNA) and
declared a state of emergency that suspended many basic civil
rights. Human rights has been a central part of our
bilateral dialogue at all levels of our interactions with the
police, the army, and the civilian government throughout the
year. In June PD sponsored guest speaker lectures for
journalists, editors, and the government on "Freedom of
Information During a State of Emergency." The Embassy and
DAO have maintained an active dialogue on the subject of
human rights with RNA commanders during CY 02, arguing that
respect for civilian rights is a tactical necessity in
counterinsurgency as well as a moral imperative of a
democratic government. Our repeated demarches demonstrably
have influenced the human rights sensitivity of top military
leaders.


10. Emboff and DATT met with the RNA to inquire about the
arrests of two human rights activists and two journalists in
March; the four were subsequently released without charge
later in the month. The Embassy has pursued a number of
cases, including some apparent extrajudicial killings, with
the RNA's human rights cell. In one of these cases, the RNA
has provisionally disciplined two soldiers involved. Further
investigation into this case was pending at year's end. In
CY 03 the Embassy plans to coordinate assistance to the
respective human rights cells of the three branches of the
security forces (RNA, civil police, Armed Police Force) with
the British.


11. In September the Embassy's Offices of Defense
Cooperation (ODC) and Public Diplomacy jointly sponsored the
participation of two lecturers from the Defense Institute of
International Legal Studies in a two-day seminar on the Law
of Armed Conflict and Rules of Engagement for at least 20 RNA
officers at the rank of colonel and above. In December a
Department of Defense Mobile Training Team exercise, funded
through IMET, trained the RNA on civil affairs.


12. The Ambassador pressed the Prime Minister and Foreign
Ministry officials to conclude a long-pending headquarters
agreeement with an international INGO and to allow the INGO
access to detainees in military barracks. (Note: The
headquarters agreement was subsequently signed in January

2003. End note.) By the end of the year, the INGO had been
allowed at least one visit to a military barracks.


13. In June the USAID Mission initiated a project to
rehabilitate torture victims and build capacity among health
professionals that deal with torture victims. Under a
cooperative agreement with the Center for Victims of Torture
(CVICT),more than 1,000 torture victims and their families
will receive comprehensive medical and psychological care, as
well as legal counseling. Mobile treatment clinics also
conduct community awareness programs to inform rural
communities of their rights and the legal and therapeutic
recourse available to them. Fact-finding teams (composed of
a doctor, a lawyer, and a journalist) investigate, document
and report credible accounts of torture. CVICT will train
100 medical professionals in medico-legal aspects of
examination, documentation, and reporting cases of torture
and rape. The total budget for the project is USD 600,000.
MALINOWSKI