US embassy cable - 04KATHMANDU516

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 KATHMANDU 000516 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR SA/INS 
LONDON FOR POL - GURNEY 
NSC FOR MILLARD 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/21/2014 
TAGS: MOPS, PTER, PGOV, CASC, ASEC, NP, Maoist Insurgency 
SUBJECT: NEPAL:  SECURITY FORCES REPEL MAOIST ATTACK ON 
DISTRICT HEADQUARTERS IN NORTHWEST 
 
REF: A. KATHMANDU 397 
     B. KATHMANDU 437 
 
Classified By: DCM RKBOGGS.  REASON:  1.5 (B,D). 
 
1.  (SBU)  At about 11:00 p.m local time on March 20, Maoist 
insurgents attacked Beni, the headquarters of Myagdi District 
in west-central Nepal.  Initial reports indicate that 13 
Royal Nepal Army (RNA) soldiers, 7 policemen, and 1 civilian 
were killed, and 80 police are still missing.  (Note:  A 
Maoist press statement acknowledges the loss of 40 cadres, 
but reports from the field indicate that 90 Maoist bodies 
have been recovered.  The RNA estimates Maoist dead at 
between 160-500.  According to early press reports, fewer 
than 20 Maoist bodies have been recovered.  End note.)  The 
Chief District Officer (CDO), the highest-ranking civil 
servant in the district, and the Deputy Superintendent of 
Police (DSP), the highest-ranking police officer, were 
reported missing.  Beni, about 50 km northwest of Pokhara and 
250 km northwest of Kathmandu, is located on a popular 
trekking route to the Annapurna Mountain range.  The Consular 
section has received no reports from American citizens 
affected by the fighting. 
 
2.  (U)  According to press reports, the Maoists attacked the 
headquarters from three sides in one of the longest 
engagements in the eight-year insurgency, firing on the 
police station, the jail, the District Administration Office, 
and the local branch of a commercial bank.  While the 
insurgents succeeded in overruning the police station and 
jail (releasing all 31 detainees), and in destroying a 
telecommunications tower, an attack on the RNA barracks, 
which housed members of an engineering brigade building a 
road from Myagdi to the adjoining district of Mustang, was 
repelled.  By about 10:00 a.m. local time on March 21, the 
Maoists had withdrawn from the site.  A press release from 
Maoist leader Prachanda, dated March 21, claimed that the 
so-called People's Liberation Army had taken the Chief 
District Officer and Deputy Superintendent of Police 
prisoner, while acknowledging the death of the Maoists' "vice 
brigade commander" in the battle.  According to a source in 
the diplomatic community, the Maoists reportedly paraded the 
CDO and DSP around neighboring villages in an effort to 
humiliate them. 
 
3.  (C)  According to RNA sources, the Maoists used 81 mm 
mortars and some rocket-propelled grenade launchers in the 
attack.  One dead Maoist was found with an AK-47.  Weapons 
were recovered from another four dead Maoists found within 
the perimeter defenses of the army camp.  The Maoists 
reportedly used the local office of British aid agency DFID 
as a makeshift hospital during the battle.   RNA sources said 
the Army had received prior indications of a Maoist build-up 
in the area, and a reserve unit of approximately 90 soldiers 
from Pokhara was sent to supplement the reinforced company of 
94 guarding the district headquarters.  Reinforcements, 
including two companies of RNA Rangers, were airlifted to 
Beni after the attack on early March 21.  Earlier efforts to 
reinforce the positions by helicopter were frustrated by bad 
weather and poor visibility.  Indian-built Lancer attack 
helicopters reportedly engaged a column of retreating Maoists 
with rockets.  RNA reinforcements have set up blocking 
positions in an effort to intercept retreating Maoists, which 
the RNA estimates number several thousand, across difficult 
and mountainous terrain. 
 
4.  (C)  Comment:  The Maoists' blockade of major roads in 
the Pokhara area may have made it easier for them to move 
large numbers of cadres without detection (Ref B).  (Note: 
The blockade was withdrawn on March 21.)  The assault on Beni 
marks the second Maoist attack on a district headquarters 
within about three weeks (Ref A) and occurred just one week 
before King Gyanendra's planned visit to Pokhara.  The 
Government of Nepal (GON) had touted the King's travel to 
distant parts of the country, including some areas under 
Maoist influence, as proof that the insurgents are not in 
control of their purported heartland.  Kidnapping the 
Government's highest-ranking official in a neighboring 
district so soon before the monarch's visit is apparently the 
Maoists' defiant response to that message.  The Maoists 
remain unable to retain control of a district headquarters, 
but this attack demonstrates that they still have the 
capacity to stage large-scale attacks on government centers 
in mountainous areas of the kingdom, where the topography 
inhibits a quick RNA response.  Leading members of Nepal's 
major political parties already are pointing to the attack as 
proof that the government does not have the security 
situation sufficiently under control to hold elections. 
MALINOWSKI