THE KING AND THE MAOISTS: FROM FOE TO FRIEND TO FOE

S E C R E T KATHMANDU 000732 SIPDIS SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/09/2017 TAGS: PGOV PTER PINR IN NP SUBJECT: THE KING AND THE MAOISTS: FROM FOE TO FRIEND TO FOE Classified By: Ambassador James F. Moriarty. Reasons 1.4 (b/d) Maoist Internal Divisions Lead to Admission About the King -------------- -------------- ¶1. (SBU) An article by a former senior Maoist turned dissident that appeared in mid-January 2007 in one of Nepal's leading newsweeklies casts light on the somewhat bewildering turns that have characterized the relationship between King Gyanendra and Maoist chief Prachanda. Maoist dissident Rabindra Shrestha claimed in an account in Samaya -- that the Maoists have yet to refute -- that Prachanda admitted to members of the Politburo at Lawang village in Rukum District in January 2005 that he had been in touch with King Gyanendra. The Politburo meeting had been called to discipline Prachanda's deputy, Dr. Baburam Bhattarai, whom Prachanda accused of having secret connections with the Indian intelligence agency RAW. Prachanda also accused Bhattarai of contributing to the arrest of a few top Maoist leaders in India a few months earlier and of perhaps even scheming to have Prachanda arrested. Shrestha alleged that Prachanda made the disclosure about contact with Gyanendra because he was having trouble getting enough votes in the Politburo and because the news was starting to leak out. Contact with King Gyanendra Detailed -------------- ¶2. (SBU) At the time, the Maoist People's Liberation Army was fighting an insurgency against the Royal Nepalese Army, which the King commanded. Interestingly, before his mid-January 2005 admission to his comrades, Prachanda had on several occasions publicly asserted that the Maoists would only negotiate with the King, and not with the multi-party government led by then Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba. Shrestha claimed in the Samaya article that Prachanda's secret talks with King Gyanendra had gone quite far. SIPDIS Prachanda apparently had attempted to "counter" Bhattarai's alliance with India by striking an alliance with the King. The Maoist chief tried to make a deal with the Palace, not the parties, because the King was really the one in charge, according to Shrestha. In fact, one of Prachanda's proposals to Gyanendra through the King's intermediary, a high-level Army official, was that the royalists and the Maoists join hands to "discipline" the parties. In response, the King, through the same individual, proposed that the King be accorded the same status and respect as King Sihanouk in Cambodia. In return, the King was prepared to make Prachanda Prime Minister. Prachanda sent a request to meet Gyanendra immediately. Although tentative plans had been made for the King and the Maoist chief to meet in Rolpa District not far from where the Politburo was meeting, the King delayed meeting Prachanda and proposed a new location, a royal hunting reserve in Rukum and Myagdi Districts. Before they could meet, the King took power February 1, 2005 in a royal coup. Comment -------------- ¶3. (S/NF) When the history of Nepal's monarchy and the country's transformation is written, one of the most interesting chapters will recount the shifts in the relationship between King Gyanendra and the Maoists. We were aware of contacts between the Palace and the Maoists in the months running up to the King's February 1 coup. Presumably, the King thought he could double-cross the Maoists by seizing power without telling them and then convince them to come into government from a weaker position. Unfortunately for him, however, even Prachanda had to admit that following the King's betrayal, it made more sense for the Maoists to join hands with the parties to topple Gyanendra. The King's strategy failed miserably, while that of the Maoists appears close to total success. MORIARTY