Roundup: Nepali gov't-guerrilla peace talks close to conclusion

The Nepali peace process is heading towards final solution soon with agreement on all the pending issues in a single package if the leaders of ruling Seven- Party Alliance (SPA) and guerrillas are to be believed.

They have reached close to understanding on the issue of arms management, the most contentious issue along with space for the king, interim constitution, parliament, government and process of election to Constituent Assembly (CA).

The Constituent Assembly is an elected body, like parliament, of elected people's representatives to formulate the new constitution.

Although the news about the government agreeing to arms management of guerrillas through a single key system, in which only the guerrillas will have keys to the store, was carried in a newspaper, a senor ruling Nepali Congress (NC) leader, however, said they were yet to reach into a final agreement on the issue.

"We are discussing other possibilities including double lock system with both the guerrillas and the United Nations owning keys to store where the guerillas' weapons have been locked and the single lock with sealing of weapons," said Shekhar Koirala, the NC leader, who is closely involved in the negotiation process.

He said that they were very close to agreement on the issue of arms management and that they have already reached a common preliminary understanding on the space of the king, interim constitution, government, parliament and procedure of the CA election.

Guerrilla leader Barsa Man Pun alias "Ananta" also said they were yet to reach a common understanding on arms management although they reached a preliminary understanding on other key political issues.

Talking to Xinhua here on Wednesday, he made it clear that they agreed to lock up their all arms as per single key system although their previous stand was to lock up their 50 percent weapons as per double key system before joining the interim government.

"We need to have at least thin control over our weapons until both the Nepali army and guerrillas are restructured democratically," he said.

Ananta also made it clear that they agreed on keeping representation of one third each from the ruling NC, the Communist Party of Nepal (United Marxist-Leninist) and the guerrillas as well as equal representation from the three parties in the interim government too.

"The king will remain there with no power in his hand until the election to the Constituent Assembly and his all other properties will be nationalized except his private properties," he said.

Meanwhile, The Kathmandu Post, a national daily, has reported on Wednesday that India was positive to the proposal of a single lock system of guerillas' weapons while the United States expressed dissatisfaction over it.

Shekhar Koirala said that they were in an intense dialogue among the political parties and expected to reach a final agreement within a day or two.

"It will take additional two or three days to hold the summit talks following the final agreement in informal talks because we will have to make preparation for signing a comprehensive peace accord," he said.

Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala recently said that they would hold no more formal summit talks after the next one because they were working to garner final agreement informally before signing them in the formal summit talks.

Source: Xinhua