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Kathmandu, Sep 19 (IANS) In an unprecedented flexing of muscles and flouting of international norms, Nepal's Maoist guerrillas made hundreds of school children attend their rally at the heart of the capital, triggering widespread public outrage. Students as young as 10-year-old were made to wear red caps with the rebels' party symbol and red bandannas and listen to guerrilla leaders' propaganda for nearly five hours under the scorching sun on Monday. The rally was held at a public park in the capital, a stone's throw away from parliament, the prime minister's office and the army headquarters. The militant student wing...

MAOIST rebels in India slit the throats of 13 of 40 tribal villagers abducted earlier this week in the restive central state of Chhattisgarh, police said today. The killings are the latest in a series in some of the dozen or so states where Maoist guerrillas operate. The bodies were found deep in the forest 22km from a government-run relief camp which was near the spot where the group had been taken hostage at gunpoint in revolt-hit Dantewada district. "The bodies had multiple wounds and rebels killed them by slitting their throats," district police chief Praveer Das said. Yesterday, police...

Kathmandu : Nepal's Maoist guerrillas took advantage of the ceasefire called by them in September to buy arms from India, the official media here reported Friday. The Rising Nepal daily, the mouthpiece of the government headed by King Gyanendra, said the information was given to the Royal Nepalese Army by an ex-Maoist "combatant". The informer, the daily said, was a 13-year-old girl from Ilam district in eastern Nepal. Ishwara Neupane aka Richa, who reportedly surrendered to security forces and was presented at a press conference at the district administration office in Jhapa, also in eastern Nepal, was quoted as saying...

Kathmandu, June 9 (PTI) Armed groups of Maoists have abducted some 1,000 students and teachers from different schools in western Nepal for forceful indoctrination on rebel ideology, state-run media reported today. The rebels abducted students mainly from Class 9 and 10 and two teachers from each school in Jajarkot district, 'The Rising Nepal' daily said. Maoists forcefully took away 150 students and two teachers from Shankar Secondary School at Bahun Thana of Jajarkot district yesterday, the daily said quoting a teacher of the school. They have taken other 850 students and teachers from 11 schools of the district towards unknown...

KATHMANDU (Reuters) - Maoist rebels in western Nepal have abducted at least 450 school children over the past three days and beaten local aid workers prompting foreign donors to suspend some operations, officials said. The army said the pupils were taken in Palpa, Tanahun and Baglung districts. The Maoists regularly abduct school children in remote areas for indoctrination or to boost numbers in pro-Maoist rallies. The children are generally returned after a few days unharmed. Violence has continued in the Himalayan kingdom since King Gyanendra seized power on Feb. 1. The Maoists have been fighting since 1996 to overthrow the...

Kathmandu, Sept 19 (PTI) Suspected maoist rebels have abducted more than 100 students and teachers from three schools in western and eastern districts of Nepal over the weekend, media reports said today. The rebels kidnapped 49 students from Panchakanya Secondary school and Navadurga Secondary school in Bhojpur district of eastern Nepal today, state-run Radio Nepal reported. Three local people have also been abducted in the district. In another incident, 45 students and 7 teachers have been abducted from a secondary school in the far-western district of Baitadi on Friday, The Rising Nepal reported. Following the incident, security forces have launched...

KATHMANDU, July 19 (Reuters) - Maoist guerrillas have abducted at least 50 students and a dozen teachers from a school on the outskirts of the Nepali capital in a bid to force them into their fold, a police officer said on Monday. The rebels dragged the children, aged between 13 and 16, and teachers at gunpoint from the school in Chaimale village on Sunday afternoon, police officer Deepak Ranjit said. The Maoists, who are fighting to overthrow Nepal's constitutional monarchy, have in the past kidnapped school and university students to boost their numbers. Ranjit said soldiers have been deployed to...

KATHMANDU, July 2 (OneWorld) - Impoverished Dalits, considered untouchables in the Hindu caste hierarchy, have become prime targets of increasing Maoist violence in Nepal, with the guerrillas abducting around 700 of them, killing four and smashing the legs of eight in the last month alone. The attacks have shocked many because the Maoists traditionally proclaim themselves to be the champions of the Dalits, who are often ill treated in this Hindu kingdom because of the position they occupy on the social ladder. Says a former chairman of the National Dalit Commission, Padma Singh Biswokarma, "Earlier, the Dalits used to be...

A landmine blast killed 21 policemen and injured 16 others yesterday in Nepal in the deadliest attack attributed to Maoist rebels since the prime minister was reappointed and called for new peace talks. The policemen were on a search mission for Maoist hideouts in the insurgency-torn southwestern Nepalgunj district when their truck was blown up by underground explosives, police said. "Two of the 21 policemen who died were of high rank. The Maoists disappeared after the attack," senior police officer Ravi Raj Thapa told AFP. He said 13 of the injured policemen were airlifted to a hospital in the capital...

<p>Kathmandu, Nepal, Jun. 4 (UPI) -- Maoist rebels have abducted about 500 teachers from 30 villages of Nepal's Udaypur district this week, reports said Friday.</p> <p>The District Education Officer said there are a total 578 teachers in the district.</p> <p>The rebels reportedly abducted the teachers to give them training on Maoist literature and to pressure the teachers into following the Maoist educational calendar, nepalnews.com. said.</p>

Maoist guerrillas in Nepal have abducted over 1,000 people, including teachers and students, officials said Saturday. The Maoists have abducted 300 teachers and 500 students from 270 schools in Jajarkot district, apart from several locals, in the past three days, according to state-run Radio Nepal. They were picked up by the Maoists to make them attend organisational programmes conducted by them, the radio quoted local security officials as saying. The Maoists forced the teachers to close schools to attend the programmes, which are held in remote areas of western Nepal. The Maoists have been fighting to establish a republic state...

At least 10 people were killed and four were injured in a clash between Maoist rebels and security forces in Nepal Thursday as media reports said the guerrillas had abducted over 1,000 villagers in the western part of the kingdom. Eight Maoist rebels and two security personnel were killed in the clash in Pahalmanpur area of Kailali district Thursday morning, officials said. Four security personnel were injured in the skirmish. The fighting continued till Thursday evening, state-run Radio Nepal quoted security officials as saying. The clash broke out after Maoists attacked security forces patrolling the area. The death toll among...

KATHMANDU : Maoist rebels abducted around 1,500 youths from three villages in a remote corner of south-western Nepal , a local village official said on Wednesday. The kidnappings late yesterday were the latest in a wave of abductions by the rebels, who security officials say take students, teachers and others to draft them into their ranks and "re-educate" them at Maoist camps. "The Maoists kidnapped 1,500 youths and students including teenage girls from Tribhuvan Basti, Kalipa and Parasa villages in Kanchanpur district," Rajendra Singh Rawal, an elected council official, said. "The rebels took these 1,500 people in 27 tractor-trailers to...

This week, Nepal's Maoist rebels announced plans to raise a militia of 50,000 children by April, amid reports of mass abduction, even sexual abuse of kids, who they allegedly use as cannon fodder. On February 22, the leader of the Maoists student wing, Kamal Shahi, said the decision to raise child militia was taken by the rebel leadership on January 10-11. This marks a major departure from their previous commitments to avoid recruiting children below the age of 18. The radical decision has raised the hackles of rights activists and international organizations which have criticized the ideological indoctrination and military...

Maoists abduct 300 school students in Nepal Kathmandu, February 20 Maoists rebels in Nepal have abducted about 300 school students and half a dozen teachers from a school in mid-western Rolpa district, a teacher who witnessed the incident said on Friday. The kidnappings occurred on Wednesday from Saiwang secondary school at Holeri village, teacher Khem Bahadur Budha said by telephone. "Armed Maoists forced the students from grade six to 10 and teachers to go with them," Budha said, adding that he feared the students would be forced to undergo military training by the rebels and be drafted into their rebellion...

Kathmandu, Feb 12 (DPA) Maoist insurgents abducted more than 700 people from different villages of the west Nepal hill district of Achham to take part in the Maoist insurgency anniversary celebrations, the Nepali language daily Kantipur reported today. The report said the abductions took place during the past few days. The Maoists are observing the completion of eight years of their Peoples War on February 13. The armed Maoist insurgency began in February 1996 with the objective of setting up a communist republic in Nepal. The newspaper said the villagers were abducted after they refused to take part in the...

Nepal's Maoists have abducted a total of 192 school students in western Nepal in recent days and are forcing them to undergo military training, witnesses and officials said on Sunday. Ramesh Pokharel, a teacher at Bajura district, 340 kilometres west of Kathmandu, said 104 school students and some teachers were taken by the rebels on last Thursday from a school in Rameswori village to an unknown location. Another 88 students were abducted from a school in Pujyatala village in Achham district, 360 kilometres west of Kathmandu on Friday, a village official said. Home Ministry spokesman Gopendra Bahadur Pandey confirmed that...