US embassy cable - 02KATHMANDU921

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 KATHMANDU 000921 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
GENEVA FOR RMA 
LONDON FOR RIEDEL 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREF, PTER, PGOV, KCRM, PHUM, SMIG, NP, Tibetan Refugees, Maoist Insurgency 
SUBJECT: Tibetan Refugees Hard Hit by Maoist Insurgency 
 
REFS: A) Kathmandu 655, B) 01 Kathmandu 2352 
 
1. (SBU) Summary.  Nepal's Tibetan refugee community has 
been seriously affected by the violent Maoist insurgency, 
most directly by a recent string of bombings at Tibetan- 
owned carpet businesses and threats to Tibetan-run tourist 
facilities.  Tibetans have made a significant contribution 
to Nepal's economy, although many of their carpet 
factories - that once generated one-fifth of the country's 
foreign exchange - now sit idle due to problems related to 
the insurgency and a general market downturn.  A Tibetan 
refugee hotel owner told Poloff a tale of attempted 
extortion typical of recent problems encountered by long- 
term Tibetan residents in the deteriorating security 
environment.  In the face of these problems many Tibetans 
have chosen to put their first country of asylum behind 
them and take flight once more.  End Summary. 
 
Maoist Insurgency Pinches Tibetan Community 
------------------------------------------- 
 
2. (U) Of the many ethnic communities in Nepal, the 
Tibetan refugees have perhaps been most seriously affected 
by the violent Maoist insurgency that has now spread to 
all but one of the country's 75 districts.  In the past 
six months suspected Maoist attacks against three Tibetan- 
owned carpet businesses have left the community on edge 
(Reftels).  The effects of the decline in tourism - 
another industry with substantial Tibetan investment - 
have also hit the community hard. 
 
Tibetans and Nepal's Economy 
---------------------------- 
 
3. (SBU) Although there has been a Tibetan community in 
Nepal for millennia, the Tibetan refugee community dates 
back to the 1959 flight of the Dalai Lama from Tibet. 
Initially the GON allowed Tibetans to stay, but in 1989 it 
reversed this policy and now no longer accept new Tibetan 
refugees for resettlement.  However, since 1989 the GON 
has worked with UNHCR to ensure that intending refugees 
from Tibet are afforded safe passage to India. 
 
4. (U) Nepalese readily admit that the Tibetans have made 
a significant contribution to Nepal's economy.  Legally, 
Tibetan refugees are not permitted to work in Nepal, but 
in practice, the GON has long allowed them to engage in 
trade and entrepreneurial activity so long as they do so 
in tandem with local partners.  Tibetan-owned enterprises 
employ tens of thousands of people. 
 
5. (U) The Tibetans brought the art of carpet weaving 
along with them to Nepal and established the country's 
first carpet factories.  In recent years carpet exports 
accounted for nearly twenty percent of foreign exchange 
earnings.  However, due to problems related both to the 
insurgency and to the global economic downturn, this 
figure has gone down as many Tibetan carpet businesses 
have either folded or dramatically downsized. 
 
Trouble Began Two Years Ago 
--------------------------- 
 
6. (SBU) For nearly four decades, Tibetan refugees lived - 
and for the most part thrived - as just another of the 
many ethnic groups inhabiting Nepal.  That began to change 
in recent years as the Maoist insurgency gathered steam. 
To solicit contributions, Maoists have approached Tibetan 
homes, businesses - and even monasteries.  Last year when 
the Maoists planned a mass rally in Kathmandu, groups of 
insurgents approached monasteries in the Boudha area of 
the city to insist that the monks provide room and board 
to Maoists who were coming to the city to join the rally. 
 
Maoist Extortion? 
----------------- 
 
7. (SBU) One businessman approached Poloff to tell a story 
illustrative of the problems facing the Tibetan refugee 
community as a result of growing lawlessness related to 
the insurgency.  The man, who operates a hotel in 
Kathmandu's tourist quarter, has been in business in Nepal 
for more than three decades.  Life in Nepal was peaceful 
and uneventful, he says, until he began to feel the pinch 
of the decline in tourism and the deteriorating law-and- 
order situation about two years ago. 
 
8. (SBU) The hotelier's serious troubles began in August, 
2001, when he received a letter - purportedly from the 
Maoists - threatening his property and family.  It said he 
would be contacted by phone.  Within days a call came 
demanding 200,000 Nepali Rupees (NRs.), about USD 2500. 
Three men came to his hotel and - after hard bargaining - 
he paid 50,000 Rs. (USD 650).  The men gave him a receipt 
printed with Maoist slogans. 
 
Police and Thieves 
------------------ 
 
9. (SBU) The story took a disturbing turn in January 2002, 
when one of the three men returned to the hotel claiming 
to be a police officer.  He invited the hotelier to visit 
him at the official Police Club, where they sat in a small 
waiting room inside the main gate.  The man - who had a 
pronounced scar on his cheek - explained that he was a 
policeman, but also worked for the Maoists.  He displayed 
a letter on Home Ministry letterhead that identified the 
hotelier as a Maoist contributor.  If this letter is sent 
to the police post in your area, the man with the scar 
said, they will arrest you.  He offered to exchange the 
file for money:  400,000 Rs. (USD 5000).  The hotelier 
paid 100,000 Rs. on the spot, and arranged to meet the 
next day to pay the balance. 
 
No Such File 
------------ 
 
10. (SBU) After that encounter, the hotelier went to the 
police station to report what happened.  The police told 
him they had no such file tagging him as a Maoist 
supporter.  They offered to wait for the man at the agreed- 
upon meeting point and arrest him.  The next day the man 
called to cancel the appointment.  After that, the man 
would call again to schedule meetings, the hotelier would 
inform the police, who would then stake out the scene. 
Each time the man would fail to show.  The police brought 
the hotelier to see line-ups of scar-faced men.  Officers 
were sent to guard his hotel around the clock, but after a 
month, as the hotelier prepared to leave for India one 
day, the police guards left early in the morning.  Within 
the hour the man with the scar and two accomplices entered 
the hotel and threatened to arrest the owner if he did not 
pay.  He left after accepting a few thousand Rupees and a 
promise of more. 
 
No Way Out 
---------- 
 
11. (SBU) Fearful for his own and his family's safety, the 
hotel owner no longer travels alone or at night.  He 
suspects the extortionist has ties to the police - the man 
used the police club as a meeting point and seemed to have 
access to inside police information - and now feels he 
cannot rely on the police to protect him.  Even if the 
extortionist were arrested, he doubts there would be 
enough evidence to hold him.  All he can do, he believes, 
is avoid the extortionists as much as possible and push 
them back with small sums and vague promises.  Eventually, 
he hopes, they will lose interest and leave him alone. 
Until that time he lives in fear, he says. 
 
Exodus 
------ 
 
12. (U) We have heard countless tales resembling the 
hotelier's in one way or another.  As a result of these 
and other incidents thousands of ethnic Tibetans have left 
Nepal in the past decade, fleeing increasing instability 
and economic uncertainty.  Many left for the U.S., Canada, 
Australia or Europe.  Others sought employment in Hong 
Kong or Japan.  Still others moved south; many of Nepal's 
Tibetans were educated at the boarding schools in India's 
hill stations.  They are thus better prepared for life in 
India than in Nepal, where many opportunities are closed 
to them. 
 
13. (U) Those who remained behind often comment, 
anecdotally, on the contraction of their community. 
Festivals that in previous years attracted thousands of 
Tibetan worshippers now attract only hundreds.  Hearing 
complaints about the recent decline of Tibetan social life 
in Kathmandu, Poloff asked if the ongoing Maoist 
insurgency had kept people indoors at night.  No, our 
contacts replied, the fact is that large numbers of young 
Tibetans have gone abroad and the parties have not been 
the same since. 
 
Comment 
------- 
 
14. (SBU) Faced with an increasingly inhospitable 
environment created in large part by the Maoist 
insurgency, many Tibetan refugees in Nepal have elected to 
pull up stakes.  Most of those leaving are the children of 
refugees who fled Tibet in the late 1950s, and are thus 
doubly displaced.  Sadly, until the recent troubles most 
Tibetans in Nepal had been able to flourish both 
economically and culturally.  Excluded from the local 
political system, they can now only watch as their 
businesses come under siege and economic conditions 
worsen.  As shown by the case of the attempted extortion 
of the Tibetan hotelier, regardless of whether Nepal's 
Tibetan refugees are being victimized by the Maoists, the 
Police or people purporting to be police, or merely by 
opportunistic gangsters, many now live in fear.  Staying 
in Nepal is no longer worth the trouble and many are 
choosing to shutter their businesses and leave. 
 
MALINOWSKI