US policy towards Nepal : Unrealistic and disastrous - Sundar Mani Dixit
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US ambassador James Moriarty’s recent statements have caused concern amongst Nepalis who are hoping for a lasting peace through the ongoing negotiations between the government and the Maoists. While holding forth an impressive aid amount for peace, democracy and development, he has tried to obstruct the Maoists’ entry into an interim government till they lay down their arms. This is an unrealistic and even disastrous stand for Nepal’s future and thus needs to be reversed.

The ambassador unveils aid for peace, democracy and development all of which are impossible or in danger unless the Maoists can be permanently brought into the political mainstream. The successful people’s revolution with the peaceful support of the Maoists had demanded elections to a constituent assembly (CA) through the agency of an inclusive interim government with the Maoists in it.

This was imperative because the grassroots reality is that there can be no elections without Maoist support. And without CA polls as soon as possible there is every danger of the king coming back to power with the army’s help. The army, barring the name change, remains what it was yesterday: a loyal and committed royalist force. It is only the show of people power in the streets that has held it back so far, but the people can’t come out on the streets forever. Any delay in quickly getting a CA in place can be deadly.

If USA wants to help Nepal,,, it's quite easy.. all it needs to do is remove Maoists Gangsters of Prachanda from the list. Will USA do that?

But, why are you guys arguing... Prachanda will be CRUSHED soon.

WILL NUCLEAR POWER HELP IRRIGATION AND DRINKING WATER FOR HUGE POPULATION ? DO YOU THINK INDIANS WILL BE DRINKING ELECTRICITY ? GIVE ELECTRICITY TO PLANTS ?

karmarana, i think US is shaking hands with india this time to control nepal and increase their business in india (large population), just think if you manufacture 1 rupees chocolate and billions of indians buying them !

sajhouser...hahaha.haha ............you mean india will be sending electricity current in drinking pipe lines and for irrigation ooopp..........electricity will help plant to grow ha............. you are very naughty........you are latest scientist......you must discover this..........how much a bottle of electricity cost produced from nuclear energy ? London is having drinking water problem, it is nuclear station ...............he he he

have you read a news few months ago ? bin laden wanted to stopfighting but bush wanted to continue ????

You are right, mann ma mero nepal, when you said -

"By the way i will choose any one,the parties or the king but not this killer and his team."

not team, it's Gangsters - panwaala.

ktm_np, why you screaming? he hehe.....first of all i thought you were talking about hydro electricy. So you mean india is so desparate for drinking water that they will buy water from nepal to quench their thirst? and irriagate their acres and acres of feild with nepal's water? FYI many rivers are flowing from nepal to india for their drinking and irriagation purposes.

sajhouser, please refer to International Policy of River, then you will get it, do you think nepal will have rights on its rivers ? no way.

I think Nepal needs a better leader who only think of Nepal and Nepali heart, a pure nationalist.

rudra prasad upadhya, I don't think you read what i wrote. China is growing like india is, but it doesn't have infrastructure. Villages in china are as rural as indian or more worse. We don't see that because our culture is closer to indians and we don't understand chinese. By saying "As China is starting to capitalize, there has been a huge disparity of cash distribution in China". I didn't mean the communism that was there was before was good.

Becasue the infrastructure there is not good, the government policy is not good, people are suffering in china. But we don't see that, we only see what's in media (that only shows the big cities). The other parts of china is totally censored. One of my chinese friends said that in places in china, there isn't even enough water to take shower, no food to eat, so they are even ready to come to city and work as slaves, without taking any money. Atleast they can take shower, atleast they can have food to eat.

Where as US is different, it has very good policy for their own people. Most of all, people have right to speak and demand. "USA also has a pretty big disparity in term of cash distribution, but you cannot deny that America is an economic powerhouse". USA might have cash diaprity, but it isn't as big as third world countries, that's why it's economic powerhouse. I am not denying that fact, I am only saying that US's foreign policy is not good.

So to build infrastruture in nepal, there has to be good policies, like minimum wage, benefits, etc. When people start earning money they themselves can invest little amt, if not much, to develop on their own. When people are too poor, there is always bound to be problemos.

Nobody mentioned about "giving-back thing" that US does for the under-avg earners in form of benefits....is that also communism? why do people scream when i talk abt giving back? i didn't say give back all and share....And let me repeat again, if US stops giving benefits, the domestic terrorism in US will rise.

ktm_np, so how does it relate to india for not having enough electricty, and water for irrigation and drinking purposes?

I read your last argument. I hadn't followed the whole debate. But anyway, dude, I don't really buy your argument because China's annual growth rate is at around 9%, while that of India's is between 6-8% (estimate varies of course). Another point I'd like to make is that 36% of Chinese live in Urban areas, while the rest( 64%) in rural areas.In India's case, approximately 60% live in rural areas. Anybody with a knowledge in this field would tell you that China is growing at a faster pace than India. Sure, both India and China have potential, nobody's gonna deny that. So I would say that in terms of rural developments, China and India are about equal. However, here's the deal: a sizable number of Chinese live in Xinjiang and Tibet, and these people have been ignored because they're not "ethnic Chinese". However, last I heard, even in Xinjiang province, Han Chinese have taken over the indigenous population. Only recently in the Washington Post, I read this one article that suggested that the indigenous population felt that they were being ignored by the Chinese government, and were in fact not "feeling" China's economic prosperity.
I personally think that China has a bigger "poor vs rich" divide than India. After all, I am not aware of any Chinese billioinaires except those in Hong Kong. Another point to make here is that as a country makes progress, the rich-poor divide will narrow. America, for example, had a bigger rich-poor divide in the past, than it does today. With more job opportunities, the problem will solve by itself. Now, America did go through it's own depression before FDR came up with his "new deal". I don't really believe in handouts and welfare. I think that if you want to succeed in life, you gotta pull yourself up your bootstraps, put some elbow grease, and start truckin. The difference between the really rich vs the really poor is motivation. I mean look at Bill Gates. The guy is a workaholic, for crying out loud. Many of these poor people are good-for-nothing bums who laze around doing nothing but swat flies all night long. So let's think about it for a second. This is exactly why socialism does not really work. The difference is in terms of motivation. Why should a hard-working individual let his tax dollars be wasted on some lazy bum who does nothing but sleep all day long? Do you know what I am saying dude?

Your argument is that America's rich-wide divide is smaller than that of India's or China's. Of course that's true. That has to do with the fact that it is a developed nation. India and China will also narrow the divide as it develops. Fact of life dude. As to benefits, come on dude, Nepal's government is just so damn poor. Where will the money come from?

rudra prasad upadhya,

Even if not much, money will trickle from the taxpayers. The money could have been used to develop villages, but instead, it goes into royalites pockets. In Nepal's situation, benefits can be given indirectly. By building roads etc. The money that the king spent in buying jaguar could be used to do so much in a small villages.

All poors in America are not lazy bums as you mentioned. Someone who earns mininum wage and is a single parent needs benefits. But then lazy bums also take advantage of it. That's why there is no 'utopia'.

How much did Bill Gates get criticized for hoarding money? Because of his wife, some knowledge about philanthropy has trickled in his head and has started giving away his wealth.

I believe America grew rapidly because it won the second world war and could afford to buy big brains from all around the world. When you win the war, you get your say.

I believe complete capitalism cannot exist as there needs to be some amount of balance. If there is no balance, people will be ready to even give life for money, because they won't have enough to eat. Not all people have enough brain to compete, so does that mean they deserve to die of hunger? And even if they have enough brain, in a competition, if one person wins, the other has to lose. So does that mean the one who lost deserve to die of hunger?

In villages of nepal, as people start going to school and start learning, they will also learn that ktm is the land of opportunities, learn what money can buy and they start leaving their villages. As a consequence there is rise in population in ktm. So if the descision makers are not careful about developing villages, the situation in nepal is going to get more worse.

India and China will ofcourse develop if they start spending their money to build their infrastructure. But so far it hasn't happended.

It seems that you don't know more than what media shows about China. The governemnt of china controls the media. Many chinese don't even know about tiananmen square event. And there are local governements in china that completely control the people and the people can't say a single word against the government. Even yahoo, google, etc were accused (by US authorities) of blocking important events in china...because of the agreement they made with the chinese governement. So if you go to china and search about "tiananmen square", you wont get what you expect to see.

The chinese govt completely and absolutly control the media. The governemnt doesn't hesitate to kill whoever raises voice against them. So you can no way compare china with US in the past. And China is neither rich nor powerful enough to buy big brains like US did. Will it happen in future? I doubt, because US wont let anyhow. China is very hollow from inside. People are not even patriotic there...

Isn't this disastrous too?????

Armed Maoists can’t go into govt: India
By Guna Raj Luitel

NEW DELHI, July 4 - Concurring with the US envoy James F. Moriarty's recent remarks, a senior External Affairs Ministry official has called on Maoists to abandon weapons and their military before joining the interim government.
"The Maoist will have to be brought into the mainstream… however, they will have to abide by certain things," Pankaj Saran, joint secretary for Nepal and Bhutan at the ministry told a visiting Nepali media delegation Monday at his South Block office. "Without disarmament and decommissioning of arms, we can't see further political development there."

"Maoists are not terrorists in India. We welcome the peace process but you can't be in the government with arms and you can't extort money."

Significantly, he welcomed the progress made by the Seven Parties Alliance (SPA) and Maoists at Baluwatar on June 16. "If the understanding is not respected, there will be problems," he said, adding that India would respect the verdict of the Nepali people because "India wants to see peace in Nepal."

He also urged Maoists not to backtrack from the commitment made during the ongoing peace process. But he also expressed concern over reports of intimidation, extortion and closure of industries in Birgunj.

He also said that the commitment made during Premier Girija Prasad Koirala's visit will be implemented soon. "Our interest is to see an economically prosperous and politically stable Nepal," he said. "For economic progress there has to be a certain degree of political stability."

In order to overcome economic backwardness, he suggested that Nepal should have full-fledged multiparty democracy. "We are not saying you should copy our system," he said. "But one needs stability and a functioning liberal multiparty democracy. It is also important for Nepal to have an independent civil service, free judiciary, strong civil society, military and police."
Posted on: 2006-07-03 20:54:39 (Server Time)

karmarana, you're offtracking this thread...

What an idiot... how did I sidelining this thread.. the title is "Disastrous US Policy" and India is saying exactly same as USA did.. so how can you say I am offtracking?

Of course not all poor people are lazy, but many are. I never said *all* poor people are lazy. The qualifier I used was "many". There are tons of jobs in America. Some people just decide to idle around and do nothing with their lives and live on welfare. These people are just leeches. Look dude, in order to provide financial incentive/support to the "little guys", the government should be making some good $$$. In case of America, it was already rich even before the world wars, but not to the level seen thereafter. The whole cotton industry in the South. The industrial boom up North in the 19th century. Even to this day the South is heavily agriculture-oriented, while most technological innovations come from the North/North-West.

" By building roads etc"

Well, seems to me like most Nepali road-building projects come from international sources like Japan. Sure, Nepal could do better in utilizing the 39 billion in GDP or whatever we make on an annual basis. I don't argue with that point. But I don't believe in making life easy for free loaders. If you wanna make money, work your butt off. The government may want to provide incentives in some shape or form, but people who're not working shouldn't be leeching off the government. Nepal's economy keeps spiralling downwards. Just imagine how much of a burden it would be on the government if we started distributing $$$ to lazy bums? Things like welfare and food stats and government handouts *should* come *only* after a country develops. Before that happens, I think the $$$ are just wasted.

" there is no balance, people will be ready to even give life for money, because they won't have enough to eat"

The money could go to building a better schooling system. Maybe, we need a good public schooling system. Free for everyone. Then again, this would be a money sink. Maybe we need better hospitals. Better roads. Apart from that, I say the government should be providing incentives to corporations. They're the ones who create jobs, not the government. Just make life easier for the corporations. Make sure foreign investors would want to invest in Nepal. For that, a stable government is required. I don't think we should even be talking about "minimum wage" and benefits. For one thing, the idea of minimum wage in America is total and utter failure because of the fact that it only provides incentive for the corporations to hire illegal immigrants and pay them under the table. That's how they save $$$: pay illegals under the table. In a country like Nepal, where nobody follows any laws, any such new rules won't really be followed. It's a big problem in a country like Nepal. Trust me on that.

"The governemnt of china controls the media. Many chinese don't even know about tiananmen square event."

Of course I know that. They even ban web pages they deem to be against China's interests. They have no freedom of the press. I am 100% for democracy, and for free market, and capitalism. No frigging way will I ever support Maobadis or for that matter Royalists. To make another point, they only reformed the Chinese economy. China is still politically communist.
China is definitely growing, whether you like it or not. It has been predicted that in 25 years, China, along with India(China will be more powerful) will take over USA in terms of GDP. Will there be poor people in these countries? Hell yeah, and lots of them.

However, the point is that the rich-poor divide will subside as a country develops. It will in China as well. And in Brazil too. I mean Russia's rich-poor divide wasn't as bad in the USSR days as it is today, but was Russia faring better. I don't think so. Today, for example, due to the economic boom, Moscow is the most expensive city on the planet, even transcending Tokyo and New York. So yeah, capitalism works wonders. Plus, I think socialism only works in a homogeneous society. The Swedes are already whining about it. Seriously. Don't forget about all those French people who died due to all the head a few years ago. They don't have a good healthcare system in France, compared to America. I mean, even America's healthcare system is a big fat joke. But France is no model either. Europeans tend to be more socialistic than Americans.

Alright, I typed this in about 15 minutes. Ignore all typos.

US probably knows that it is less expensive to spend on welfare than to patrol their troops to track who really needs welfare and who doesn't. you didn't say anthing about the single parent issue. And because of thoese kinds of issues I believe US hasn't been able to do anything about it.

In no way I meant to give free food to people in the current economic state of nepal. For nepal, benefits would be building roads. But the government has only been depending upon outside fund, when they could have attempted to do it themselves, one at a time. Yes corporation provide jobs, but they don't build roads. I don't argue with the minimum wage issue too much, because its not applicable rt now in nepal. The govt cannot track who gave how much. But it the future, it is necessary to reduce the gap between the rich and poors.....to ultimately reduce terrorism. Yes too much gap between the rich and poor increase terrorism.

And only because of maoist has the SPA been urged to interrogate upon the royal hoard. So even I don't believe in communism, although, I know that prachanda is making life hard on people, I feel nepal is finally going in right direction because of him.