CHIEF GOVERNMENT NEGOTIATOR OPTIMISTIC ABOUT

C O N F I D E N T I A L KATHMANDU 002666

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/05/2016
TAGS: PGOV PTER PREF CVIS UN CX NP
SUBJECT: CHIEF GOVERNMENT NEGOTIATOR OPTIMISTIC ABOUT
SUMMIT TALKS


Classified By: Ambassador James F. Moriarty. Reasons 1.4 (b/d).

Summary
--------------


1. (C) The Government of Nepal's chief peace negotiator
Krishna Prasad Sitaula told visiting SCA PDAS Steven Mann and
the Ambassador October 6 that he was optimistic the summit
meeting on October 8 would be successful. PDAS Mann stressed
the USG's view that it was difficult to imagine how the talks
could succeed when Maoist violence continued. In
Washington's view, it was time for the GON to start enforcing
the law. Home Minister Sitaula responded that the GON
planned to do so as soon as the Maoist combatants and their
weapons were in cantonments. He expressed regret that the
United Nations had not been able to act sooner to assemble a
team to assist the negotiations. PDAS Mann and the
Ambassador also asked the Home Minister for assistance on
Bhutanese refugees and the several hundred Tibetans who
wanted to join family members in the U.S. The Home Minister
agreed to look into the matters.

Optimistic About Peace Summit on October 8
--------------


2. (C) Home Minister and chief Government of Nepal (GON)
peace negotiator Sitaula took a break on October 6 from
preparations for the October 8 summit to discuss the peace
process with visiting SCA Principal Deputy Assistant
Secretary Steven Mann and the Ambassador. Sitaula told Mann

SIPDIS
and the Ambassador that he had been in talks since the
morning with fellow members of the governing Seven Party
Alliance (SPA) as well as the Maoists in an effort to resolve
the remaining open issues. He admitted that the talks were
at a critical stage, but he said he was also hopeful that the
GON and the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) would succeed
in reaching agreement. For the Government, that meant first
and foremost that the Maoists had to agree to separate from
their arms before they could enter an interim government.
Sitaula added that the GON was waiting for the arrival of the
UN's military expert to work on the modalities of managing
Maoist arms. Issues such as adoption of an interim
constitution depended on agreement on the arms issue first
also.

U.S. Concerned About Maoist Violence and Impunity
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3. (C) PDAS Mann emphasized that the USG very much hoped the
peace process would succeed. However, it was impossible for
us to understand how you could have a successful negotiation
when the Maoists were allowed to continue their campaign of
violence and extortion. In all his meetings since his
arrival in Nepal on October 3, the SCA PDAS said he had heard
that people were unhappy the CPN-M was being allowed to
violate its obligations under the Code of Conduct with
impunity. We believed, he stated, that it was time for the
Maoists to fulfill their commitments and for the GON to
enforce the law if they did not do so. The USG did not have
an optimistic view about the Maoists. PDAS Mann added that
it was important that the police be allowed to plan for the
contingency that the CPN-M combatants would not go into
cantonments.

Law Enforcement On Hold Until Maoists In Cantonments
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4. (C) Sitaula responded that the GON's strategy was to wait
until the Maoist combatants were in cantonments. At that
point, a law and order campaign would be successful. If they
did not go into cantonments, with their arms, that would
likely mean the end of the peace dialogue. The goal, he
said, was to have all the CPN-M insurgents in camps under UN
supervision within one month. The Government and the Maoists
were currently in discussions about the specifics of the
cantonments.

Maoists Using This Time To Build Their Strength
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5. (C) The Ambassador warned the Home Minister that the CPN-M
was using this time to make itself a stronger foe and to make
the GON look weaker. He cited the presence of a new Maoist
"tax collection" checkpoint he had encountered just outside
the national park in northern Nepal near Namche Bazaar when
he was trekking over the past week as an example of Maoist
boldness. The Maoists were continuing their efforts to
recruit, to extort money, to intimidate. They were able to
do so, the Ambassador stressed, because the GON was not
enforcing the law. The GON, Sitaula said, was serious in its
approach. The summit would decide whether dialogue would be
successful or not. The Government was in a difficult
position. The King remained a potential threat to democracy.
The political parties in the alliance also needed to be
reconciled and work together.

Sitaula Voices Disappointment About the UN
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6. (C) Minister Sitaula voiced his disappointment that the UN
had not been able to act more quickly to assemble the experts
needed to implement the GON and the Maoists' identical
letters to the UN Secretary General in August requesting the
UN's assistance with five issues, including Maoist arms
management. He said that the GON had initially had high
expectations that the UN would be able to deploy experts and
cantonment monitors rapidly. That had not happened. The
first two members of the small team supporting UN Secretary
General's personal representative for the peace process Ian
Martin were not scheduled to arrive until October 10. PDAS
Mann responded that the UN monitors would not be armed. They
would have no ability to compel the Maoists to abide by their
commitments. The Ambassador added that, if the Maoists had
really wanted to go into cantonments, they could have done so
almost two months ago. It was not fair to blame the UN for
broken promises on the part of the Maoists.

Maoist Intentions?
--------------


7. (C) PDAS Mann asked Sitaula about his impressions of the
Maoists: what were their intentions? The Home Minister
answered that he believed they would go into cantonments.
In the negotiations, they always spoke in positive terms
about their willingness to meet their commitments to
democracy and peace, but he went on to say, "I want to see
their activities." He agreed with the PDAS and the
Ambassador that their actions were different from their
words. They seemed, he stated, nevertheless, to have come to
a certain realization that their old methods could not
continue. If so, the Ambassador asked, why then did they
continue to commit abuses. Sitaula's reply was that the
CPN-M was internally divided and that some of its subgroups
had still not accepted entering the mainstream. The
Ambassador's response was that, if the Maoists could not even
control their cadre in Kathmandu, where Maoist abuses had
skyrocketed in recent months, there was a genuine question
whether it made sense for the GON to continue to negotiate
with Maoist Supremo Prachanda. Sitaula conceded that the
CPN-M did have command and control in the Kathmandu Valley
and therefore could be held responsible.

Assistance on Refugee Issues
--------------


8. (C) PDAS Mann and the Ambassador also took the opportunity
to ask the Home Minister for assistance with Bhutanese and
Tibetan refugees. Minister Sitaula was aware of PRM A/S
Sauerbrey's announcement in Geneva on October 2 of the USG's
willingness to accept as many as 60,000 Bhutanese refugees
for resettlement. The SCA PDAS noted that we appreciated the
GON's willingness to allow the 16 especially vulnerable
Bhutanese girls to travel to the U.S. and Canada, but that
there were others who also preferred resettlement to
repatriation. The Ambassador said that Bhutanese refugee
leaders such as Tek Nath Rizal claimed to speak for all the
refugees, but they did not. Rizal was not a Maoist but he
was prepared to work with them because he too wanted to keep

the refugees in camps where they could be used as a force to
"liberate" Bhutan. The Ambassador said he had been to the
camps frequently, including as recently as August with CODEL
Kolbe, and most of the refugees themselves had spoken openly
of their desire for third country resettlement. He
encouraged the GON to allow the census to proceed as soon as
possible to ensure that any resettlement program did not lead
to a new influx of refugees from Bhutan. The Home Minister
that in the coming days he would discuss with Deputy Prime
Minister and Foreign Minister Oli how to formulate a new
policy. On the Tibetans, the Ambassador noted that there was
a small group of 200-300 Tibetan asylum follow-to-join
refugees, some of whom had waited two years to rejoin their
families in the United States. The Chinese Government would
not, he thought, object to allowing them to join their
relatives. Sitaula said he would look into it.

Comment
--------------


9. (C) We continue to be convinced that it is a mistake for
the Government of Nepal to have the same person serve as the
chief peace negotiator and chief law enforcement officer. It
is also regrettable that Prime Minister Koirala chose some
weeks ago to abandon his previous pledge to the Ambassador to
replace Sitaula with someone else who would crack down on
rampant Maoist violence, extortion and intimidation. It
seems that the GON is determined to wait until the Maoists
are in cantonments to launch a crackdown. We hope they will
not have waited too long. On the issue of refugees, the
October 2 announcement by A/S Sauerbrey has prompted a
healthy discussion here of what can be done to end the long
stalemate issue over the Bhutanese refugees. If the census
proceeds and India provides assurances that no further
expulsions will be permitted by Bhutan across Indian
territory, there may be hope for a brighter future for the
Bhutanese.


10. (U) PDAS Mann did not have an opportunity to clear this
cable.
MORIARTY