Nepalese troops killed six people in the east of the country today after shooting at a crowd demonstrating over the alleged killing of a woman by soldiers, army officers said.

In an incident apparently unconnected to the political turmoil, soldiers opened fire when thousands of civilians tried to overrun an army camp in the village of Belbari. An officer said the villagers were angry because soldiers had killed a woman last night when she tried to enter the compound.

Local media reported the crowd was enraged by allegations that the soldiers had raped and killed the woman. While soldiers normally keep to their bases in rural Nepal, where Maoist insurgents pose a serious threat, they are often accused of harassing local women.

Elsewhere, Maoist rebels today withdrew a blockade of Nepal's highways but gave the country's political parties a two-day deadline to begin the process of rewriting the constitution, their leader said in a statement.

"We have withdrawn the blockade until the first meeting of the parliament, taking into consideration positive assurances," the rebel leader, Prachanda, said in the statement.

The rebels had blockaded key roads for weeks to support a campaign of anti-monarchy protests by the opposition coalition of seven political parties.

The parties called off their campaign yesterday after King Gyanendra agreed to hand power back to elected officials and reinstate parliament by Friday.

Girija Prasad Koirala, nominated by the parties to return as prime minister, appealed to the rebels to withdraw their blockade, pledging to honour their agreements. It is widely expected that the new constitution will limit the king's role or even eliminate the monarchy altogether.

Elsewhere, a man died in western Nepal from injuries inflicted by security forces during the protests, raising the death toll from clashes over the past three weeks to 15.

The man was said to be distributing water to protesters when he was shot on Saturday in Kusma, about 160 miles west of Kathmandu. He died yesterday in Pokhara, said hospital officials. Meanwhile Norway, which suspended aid to Nepal after King Gyanendra seized power 14 months ago, said it would resume its financial assistance because parliament had been reinstated.

King Gyanendra seized power in February 2005, saying he needed to restore political order and crush the insurgency, which has left nearly 13,000 people dead in the past decade.