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RUEKJCS/SECDEF WASHDC PRIORITY
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C O N F I D E N T I A L KATHMANDU 002666 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/05/2016 
TAGS: PGOV PTER PREF CVIS UN CX NP
SUBJECT: CHIEF GOVERNMENT NEGOTIATOR OPTIMISTIC ABOUT 
SUMMIT TALKS 
 
 
Classified By: Ambassador James F. Moriarty.  Reasons 1.4 (b/d). 
 
Summary 
------- 
 
¶1. (C) The Government of Nepal's chief peace negotiator 
Krishna Prasad Sitaula told visiting SCA PDAS Steven Mann and 
the Ambassador October 6 that he was optimistic the summit 
meeting on October 8 would be successful.  PDAS Mann stressed 
the USG's view that it was difficult to imagine how the talks 
could succeed when Maoist violence continued.  In 
Washington's view, it was time for the GON to start enforcing 
the law.  Home Minister Sitaula responded that the GON 
planned to do so as soon as the Maoist combatants and their 
weapons were in cantonments.   He expressed regret that the 
United Nations had not been able to act sooner to assemble a 
team to assist the negotiations.  PDAS Mann and the 
Ambassador also asked the Home Minister for assistance on 
Bhutanese refugees and the several hundred Tibetans who 
wanted to join family members in the U.S.  The Home Minister 
agreed to look into the matters. 
 
Optimistic About Peace Summit on October 8 
------------------------------------------ 
 
¶2. (C) Home Minister and chief Government of Nepal (GON) 
peace negotiator Sitaula took a break on October 6 from 
preparations for the October 8 summit to discuss the peace 
process with visiting SCA Principal Deputy Assistant 
Secretary Steven Mann and the Ambassador.  Sitaula told Mann 
 
SIPDIS 
and the Ambassador that he had been in talks since the 
morning with fellow members of the governing Seven Party 
Alliance (SPA) as well as the Maoists in an effort to resolve 
the remaining open issues.  He admitted that the talks were 
at a critical stage, but he said he was also hopeful that the 
GON and the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) would succeed 
in reaching agreement.  For the Government, that meant first 
and foremost that the Maoists had to agree to separate from 
their arms before they could enter an interim government. 
Sitaula added that the GON was waiting for the arrival of the 
UN's military expert to work on the modalities of managing 
Maoist arms.  Issues such as adoption of an interim 
constitution depended on agreement on the arms issue first 
also. 
 
U.S. Concerned About Maoist Violence and Impunity 
--------------------------------------------- ---- 
 
¶3. (C) PDAS Mann emphasized that the USG very much hoped the 
peace process would succeed.  However, it was impossible for 
us to understand how you could have a successful negotiation 
when the Maoists were allowed to continue their campaign of 
violence and extortion.  In all his meetings since his 
arrival in Nepal on October 3, the SCA PDAS said he had heard 
that people were unhappy the CPN-M was being allowed to 
violate its obligations under the Code of Conduct with 
impunity.  We believed, he stated, that it was time for the 
Maoists to fulfill their commitments and for the GON to 
enforce the law if they did not do so.  The USG did not have 
an optimistic view about the Maoists.  PDAS Mann added that 
it was important that the police be allowed to plan for the 
contingency that the CPN-M combatants would not go into 
cantonments. 
 
Law Enforcement On Hold Until Maoists In Cantonments 
--------------------------------------------- ------- 
 
¶4. (C) Sitaula responded that the GON's strategy was to wait 
until the Maoist combatants were in cantonments.  At that 
point, a law and order campaign would be successful.  If they 
did not go into cantonments, with their arms, that would 
likely mean the end of the peace dialogue.  The goal, he 
said, was to have all the CPN-M insurgents in camps under UN 
supervision within one month.  The Government and the Maoists 
were currently in discussions about the specifics of the 
cantonments. 
 
Maoists Using This Time To Build Their Strength 
--------------------------------------------- -- 
 
 
 
¶5. (C) The Ambassador warned the Home Minister that the CPN-M 
was using this time to make itself a stronger foe and to make 
the GON look weaker.  He cited the presence of a new Maoist 
"tax collection" checkpoint he had encountered just outside 
the national park in northern Nepal near Namche Bazaar when 
he was trekking over the past week as an example of Maoist 
boldness.  The Maoists were continuing their efforts to 
recruit, to extort money, to intimidate.  They were able to 
do so, the Ambassador stressed, because the GON was not 
enforcing the law.  The GON, Sitaula said, was serious in its 
approach.  The summit would decide whether dialogue would be 
successful or not.  The Government was in a difficult 
position.  The King remained a potential threat to democracy. 
 The political parties in the alliance also needed to be 
reconciled and work together. 
 
Sitaula Voices Disappointment About the UN 
------------------------------------------ 
 
¶6. (C) Minister Sitaula voiced his disappointment that the UN 
had not been able to act more quickly to assemble the experts 
needed to implement the GON and the Maoists' identical 
letters to the UN Secretary General in August requesting the 
UN's assistance with five issues, including Maoist arms 
management.  He said that the GON had initially had high 
expectations that the UN would be able to deploy experts and 
cantonment monitors rapidly.  That had not happened.  The 
first two members of the small team supporting UN Secretary 
General's personal representative for the peace process Ian 
Martin were not scheduled to arrive until October 10.  PDAS 
Mann responded that the UN monitors would not be armed.  They 
would have no ability to compel the Maoists to abide by their 
commitments.  The Ambassador added that, if the Maoists had 
really wanted to go into cantonments, they could have done so 
almost two months ago.  It was not fair to blame the UN for 
broken promises on the part of the Maoists. 
 
Maoist Intentions? 
------------------ 
 
¶7. (C) PDAS Mann asked Sitaula about his impressions of the 
Maoists: what were their intentions?  The Home Minister 
answered that he believed they would go into cantonments. 
In the negotiations, they always spoke in positive terms 
about their willingness to meet their commitments to 
democracy and peace, but he went on to say, "I want to see 
their activities."  He agreed with the PDAS and the 
Ambassador that their actions were different from their 
words.  They seemed, he stated, nevertheless, to have come to 
a certain realization that their old methods could not 
continue.  If so, the Ambassador asked, why then did they 
continue to commit abuses.  Sitaula's reply was that the 
CPN-M was internally divided and that some of its subgroups 
had still not accepted entering the mainstream.  The 
Ambassador's response was that, if the Maoists could not even 
control their cadre in Kathmandu, where Maoist abuses had 
skyrocketed in recent months, there was a genuine question 
whether it made sense for the GON to continue to negotiate 
with Maoist Supremo Prachanda.  Sitaula conceded that the 
CPN-M did have command and control in the Kathmandu Valley 
and therefore could be held responsible. 
 
Assistance on Refugee Issues 
----------------------------- 
 
¶8. (C) PDAS Mann and the Ambassador also took the opportunity 
to ask the Home Minister for assistance with Bhutanese and 
Tibetan refugees.  Minister Sitaula was aware of PRM A/S 
Sauerbrey's announcement in Geneva on October 2 of the USG's 
willingness to accept as many as 60,000 Bhutanese refugees 
for resettlement.  The SCA PDAS noted that we appreciated the 
GON's willingness to allow the 16 especially vulnerable 
Bhutanese girls to travel to the U.S. and Canada, but that 
there were others who also preferred resettlement to 
repatriation.  The Ambassador said that Bhutanese refugee 
leaders such as Tek Nath Rizal claimed to speak for all the 
refugees, but they did not.  Rizal was not a Maoist but he 
was prepared to work with them because he too wanted to keep 
 
the refugees in camps where they could be used as a force to 
"liberate" Bhutan.  The Ambassador said he had been to the 
camps frequently, including as recently as August with CODEL 
Kolbe, and most of the refugees themselves had spoken openly 
of their desire for third country resettlement.  He 
encouraged the GON to allow the census to proceed as soon as 
possible to ensure that any resettlement program did not lead 
to a new influx of refugees from Bhutan.   The Home Minister 
that in the coming days  he would discuss with Deputy Prime 
Minister and Foreign Minister Oli how to formulate a new 
policy.  On the Tibetans, the Ambassador noted that there was 
a small group of 200-300 Tibetan asylum follow-to-join 
refugees, some of whom had waited two years to rejoin their 
families in the United States.  The Chinese Government would 
not, he thought, object to allowing them to join their 
relatives.  Sitaula said he would look into it. 
 
Comment 
------- 
 
¶9. (C) We continue to be convinced that it is a mistake for 
the Government of Nepal to have the same person serve as the 
chief peace negotiator and chief law enforcement officer.  It 
is also regrettable that Prime Minister Koirala chose some 
weeks ago to abandon his previous pledge to the Ambassador to 
replace Sitaula with someone else who would crack down on 
rampant Maoist violence, extortion and intimidation.  It 
seems that the GON is determined to wait until the Maoists 
are in cantonments to launch a crackdown.  We hope they will 
not have waited too long.  On the issue of refugees, the 
October 2 announcement by A/S Sauerbrey has prompted a 
healthy discussion here of what can be done to end the long 
stalemate issue over the Bhutanese refugees. If the census 
proceeds and India provides assurances that no further 
expulsions will be permitted by Bhutan across Indian 
territory, there may be hope for a brighter future for the 
Bhutanese. 
 
¶10. (U) PDAS Mann did not have an opportunity to clear this 
cable. 
MORIARTY