Nepal steps up security to clear highways amid violence

Nepal today deployed more security in its volatile Terai region in the wake of growing violence and to clear key highways and border trade points with India even as Indian-origin Madhesis defied curfew to intensify agitation against the new Constitution.
After Nepal police shot dead four persons participating in the blockade in the southern plains prompting the Madhesis to launch a fresh campaign, the government has decided to take stern measures to quell the violence that has claimed nearly 50 lives in three months.
"We have mobilised security personnel along the highways and near the border areas so that key highways could be cleared and movement of cargo and other vehicles could resume," Home Ministry spokesperson Laxmi Prasad Dhakal said.

"The government has decided to mobilise Nepal Police, Armed Police Force and National Investigation Department personnel under special security strategy," he said.
Special security plan has been adopted to clear the highways, Dhakal added. However, the government has not yet decided to mobilise army in the Terai.
It has become necessary to mobilise all three security agencies in the southern plains in a coordinated manner in the wake of growing violence in the region, he said.

The violence comes as the landlocked country, heavily dependent on India for supplies of essential goods, continues to reel under acute shortage of fuels, medicines and other items for over two months now, and the move has been taken to ease the supplies.

Morcha protesters defied the curfew orders and staged demonstrations at various places since early this morning.
There were clashes reported in Rajbiraj district too. The police shot three shells of tear gas and few rounds of bullets in the air to disperse the crowd.
Security forces also fired several rounds of bullets in the air at Swarna Tol where police and protesters clashed. There have been reports of clash at District Police Office area as well.
The Madhesi agitation has entered its 100th day and the
protesters have been obstructing the border points with India and blocking the nationa's main East-West highway, which links Kathmandu with the Southern plains of Nepal.

In other incidents of violence, protesters hurled a petrol bomb at a bus last night and torched a motorcycle belonging to a police personnel, local media reported.
Protests are being carried out despite a curfew in place.
Meanwhile, a key Madhesi party has announced to allow movement of vehicles belonging to media, ambulances, diplomatic agencies, red cross and human rights organisation in the southern Nepal.
Issuing a statement, president of Federal Socialist Party Nepal Upendra Yadav asked everyone to cooperate in the movement of vehicles belonging to press, hospitals, the Red Cross, diplomatic agencies and human rights organisations in the Terai region.

The announcement comes two days after the agitators burnt a truck carrying medicines and vandalised ambulances carrying sick patients in Saptari district, where four persons were killed during clashes with the police on Friday night.
The blockade has also hit Indo-Nepal ties, with Kathmandu accusing India of siding with the protesters and meddling in its internal affairs, a charge New Delhi denies.
External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup yesterday expressed concern over the fresh violence in Nepal, saying India was "distressed at loss of lives in police firing in Saptari" and that a "political solution (was) required" in resolving the differences.

Nepal has turned to China for fuel, ending India's monopoly over the supplies to the landlocked Himalayan nation, and is set to seal its first oil trade deal with Beijing that has pledged to provide the petroleum products at an affordable price.