Nepal minister resigns

Nepal's multiple crisis moved into a new phase yesterday when deputy prime minister Ram Chandra Poudel resigned from the government because of disagreements with the prime minister Girija Prasad Koirala over how to deal with a Maoist insurgency which threatens the stability of the state.

Mr Poudel, who as Home Minister was responsible for controlling the insurgents, told Parliament, "In recent days the country has seen a spurt of Maoist violence and many people have been killed. This cannot continue. The prime minister did not agree with my suggestion on how to resolve the [Maoist] problem, nor did he provide any solution."

The outlawed Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) has been fighting since 1996 to bring down the monarchy and turn this impoverished Himalayan kingdom into a people's republic. Several remote districts have already fallen under their control. Since 1st June, when Crown Prince Dipendra murdered almost the entire royal family before committing suicide, they have steadily stepped up the pressure. Last week they killed 40 policemen in three different incidents, and on Wednesday abducted 70 more. They have set off crude bombs in the capital, Kathmandu, and on Thursday brought the country to a standstill with a widely observed general strike.

The prime minister is 78, in poor health and beset by corruption charges that have immobilised his government for most of this year. For weeks he has been dithering over whether to resign. Meanwhile the Maoists' ideologue and number two leader, Dr Babu Ram Bhattarai, wrote in a Kathmandu paper that a Nepali republic is at hand. "There is no point in carrying on with a system that has outlived its purpose," he wrote. "From any point of view, traditional, feudal monarchy is dead⿦the birth of the republic has already taken place."