Author: Dr. Richard Benkin
Publication: Canada Free Press
Date: June 30, 2008
URL: http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/3731
A friend recently mentioned that he had been
"hearing about the Communist victory in Nepal on NPR [National Public
Radio]." This network, funded by US taxpayers, reports news and commentary
from a generally liberal or leftist stance; although it would be incorrect
to dismiss NPR as worthless or any sort of hack journalism.
"Yeah, I've been listening to NPR and
they say they're not like the Soviet Communists," he continued. They
won power through participation in electoral politics. And in fact that is
the image that Nepal's new Maoist leaders have been trying to project ever
since joining the previous governing coalition.
News out of Nepal, however, presents a very
different picture. According to information in the South Asian Terrorist Portal,
"Maoist atrocities" are coming in from all over the country. In
some cases, it appears Nepal's new rulers are exacting a brutal revenge on
those who previously opposed them, especially in the countryside. The crackdown
was brutal enough for women to take to the streets in protest. Journalist
Niraj Aryal writes in Telegraph Nepal, "It was in the district of Dailekh-Nepal,
women folk took to the topsy-turvy Ghodeto and Godeto (Horse and Foot trails)
protesting against the Maoists' atrocities." He made sure to add, "No
male counterparts as of then had the courage to protest against the Maoists."
It is significant to note that in the bloody days before the communists got
their rebel feet in the constitutional door, it was women who were the backbone
of the Maoists' support network in the Nepali countryside. Aryal writes that
they worked as "underground party cadres or even carried weapons in the
Peoples' Liberation Army." Now many of them are rebelling against the
communists' turning their backs on their promises people's paradise.
Another Nepali journalist, identified in articles
only as "TGW," reports that "Comrade" Netra Bikram Chand
alias Biplav told a Kathmandu gathering on June 28, "The Nepali Congress
has become the stooge of the foreigners and its final objective is to disintegrate
the country." He also warned the people that foreigners (code words in
Nepal for Indians) were threatening their independence and accused "centric
parties" of collusion with them.
"The imperialists and the feudal forces
have joined hands to sideline the victory of the Nepali people and that they
are the ones who have been provoking the [centrist] parties to prolong the
deadlock."
Biplav is a party official and member of the
Central Committee. Speaking in their name he said that as a result of this
danger, the Maoists "will no longer resort to the competitive politics…
complete freedom is possible through establishing a peoples' democratic republic."
NPR failed to inform my friend that Nepal's
Maoist conducted a brutal insurgency that caused over 15,000 deaths in the
impoverished Himalayan country. Through an arrangement with Pakistani intelligence,
Maoist rebels provide safe haven for Al Qaeda troops on the run from coalition
forces in Afghanistan; and it was in exchange for those services that the
Pakistanis secured them a place in Nepal's emerging coalition. That allowed
them to get their steel toed boots in the democratic door, which led to their
electoral victory this past spring. With their transformation into a political
party both recent and tactical, however, Nepal's new communist rulers have
been systematically destroying both opposition and individual rights in that
country.
- Dr. Richard L. Benkin secured the release
of Bangladeshi journalist Salah Uddin Shoaib Choudhury in 2005. The two continue
working together to fight Islamist radicals and their allies in South Asia
and elsewhere. For more information on how to help, please contact Dr. Benkin
at drrbenkin@comcast.net.
