Police shoot protesters in Nepal riot 01/02/2007 - 15:21:24
Police opened fire on hundreds of protesters attacking government buildings in a south-eastern Nepalese town today, killing at least three people, officials said.
Police shot at the protesters after they attacked six government offices and set them on fire during a riot in Inaruwa, 190 miles south-east of Kathmandu, a government official said.
The official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to speak to reporters, said the situation was still out of control and top local government and security officials were holding emergency discussions to plan their action.
Violent protests in the region began on January 19, claiming 14 lives so far and crippling daily life.
People in the southern plains, known as the Madeshi, are pressing for more seats in the national parliament, a guaranteed number of slots in the administration and a degree of autonomy, claiming the government’s development and policy-making decisions have always favoured people living in the Himalayan mountains to the north.
Elections for a special assembly are scheduled to be held around June as part of a peace process ending a decade-old communist insurgency.
Earlier today, protest leaders rejected the prime minister’s reform proposals aimed at quelling violence in the region.
“The prime minister failed to completely address the problems of the Madeshi people,” said Upendra Yadav, chief of the Madeshi People’s Rights Forum. “We will continue our protests.”
The protesters also say local people, including many Indian migrants who crossed over the porous border and have lived there for decades, have a hard time getting citizenship certificates and other government documents.
Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala, in a broadcast yesterday on national television and radio, offered electoral reforms and urged the protesters to end their demonstrations and immediately come to the capital for talks.
Over the past two weeks, police have fired on protesters, beat them with batons, and imposed curfews to break up demonstrations.
Today, a curfew was re-imposed in some major southern towns and cities.
The strikes and curfews have hampered the flow of fuel supplies to the cities in the mountains of the north, including the capital, Kathmandu.
Since yesterday, long lines of cars and motorcycles have waited outside the handful of service stations that remained open in the capital.
According to the Petroleum Dealers’ Association, most of the stations have closed after running out of petrol.
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