US embassy cable - 03KATHMANDU1213

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 KATHMANDU 001213 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
STATE FOR SA/INS AND SA/RA 
LONDON FOR POL - GURNEY 
NSC FOR MILLARD 
SECDEF FOR OSD/ISA - LILIENFELD 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 06/26/2013 
TAGS: PGOV, PTER, EAID, NP, Government of Nepal (GON) 
SUBJECT: NEPALI GOVERNMENT SAID TO ACCEPT OUTSIDE 
ASSISTANCE ON NEGOTIATIONS 
 
REF: A. KATHMANDU 1097 
     B. KATHMANDU 0902 
 
Classified By: DCM ROBERT K. BOGGS.  REASON:  1.5 (B,D) 
 
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SUMMARY 
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1.  (C)  Summary:  According to a representative from a Swiss 
NGO, the Government of Nepal (GON) peace negotiation team has 
agreed in principle to accept outside "negotiation support," 
to be provided to both the GON and Maoist insurgents. 
Despite the delay in peace talks, the recent change in 
government, and the Maoists' increasingly belligerent 
rhetoric, the NGO representative, who maintains regular 
contact with insurgent ideologue Baburam Bhattarai, expressed 
confidence that the Maoists are not prepared to walk away 
from the table.  The newly established Peace Secretariat is 
not yet fully operational, its one-man staff primarily 
engaged in hiring new personnel and securing office space. 
Once peace talks resume, the Secretariat will be responsible 
for managing paper flow, "implementing" the decisions reached 
during negotiations, and acting as a liaison between the 
Government talk team and the media, NGOs, and the donor 
community.  While the GON plainly needs outside assistance in 
training both negotiators and Secretariat staff, it remains 
unclear if the new administration of Prime Minister Thapa 
will be more receptive to outside participation in this 
sensitive area.  End summary. 
 
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NEW GOVERNMENT MAY ACCEPT 
OUTSIDE ASSISTANCE IN TALKS 
---------------------------- 
 
2.  (C)  On June 26 Andrew Marshall (protect) of the Center 
for Humanitarian Dialogue (HD) in Geneva told poloff that 
newly apppointed Information Minister and GON talk team 
spokesman Kamal Thapa had agreed to accept limited 
"negotiation support" from the Swiss organization.  (Note: 
Marshall is a semi-frequent visitor to Kathmandu whose 
organization had offered similar support to both sides for 
negotiations during the 2001 negotiations under Prime 
Minister Deuba and the two rounds of negotiations held under 
the Chand government in April and May.  The GON had not 
previously agreed to the assistance.  Marshall maintains 
regular contact with Maoist ideologue Baburam Bhattarai.  End 
note.)  Marshall, whose organization has no permanent 
presence in Nepal, said that HD had already decided to keep 
one staff member in country indefinitely for the time being. 
The staff member has already begun providing some limited 
assistance to the four Nepali facilitators who participated 
in the last two rounds of dialogue, setting up office space 
for them in a Kathmandu hotel and helping them better define 
their role. 
 
 
3.  (C)  Marshall indicated that the "negotiation support" 
his organizatin will offer will focus, to a large degree, on 
training members of both sides on negotiating techniques and 
strategy.  The GON has not thus far developed a strategy, he 
opined, and neither side is giving appropriate focus to 
confidence-building measures or "deliverables" that create a 
sense of progress in a peace process.  The GON attitude 
toward dialogue to date has been haphazard, he continued, 
which adds to the Maoists' frustration at the lack of 
progress.  He cited the continuing controversy about whether 
the GON had agreed during the last round of talks to restrict 
the Royal Nepal Army (RNA) to within 5 km of barracks (Ref B) 
as one pitfall that could have been averted by better 
training and preparation on both sides.  (Note:  Several 
sources have confirmed to us that no one on either talk team 
nor any of the four facilitators took notes or kept written 
records of the two rounds of dialogue that have taken place 
so far.  GON negotiators, according to one well-placed 
source, attended both rounds "without even a piece of paper" 
in hand to guide their discussion.  According to one 
anecdote, when one participant asked to borrow a pen to jot 
something down during the last round, none of the 15 people 
in the room could produce one.  End note.) 
4.  (C)  Marshall said the offer for assistance is open to 
both sides--a point he claimed Thapa knows and accepts. 
Training would also be made available to the GON's newly 
formed Peace Secretariat.  Marshall said he is optimistic 
that the Maoists will respond favorably to the offer as well, 
although he admitted not having made contact with them during 
this latest visit.  (Note:  Each of the five Maoist 
negotiators is apparently out of town and out of sight for 
the time being.  Speculation is rampant that some or all may 
have returned to India.  End note.)  HD will keep any 
assistance low-key and behind the scenes, Marshall 
emphasized, and has no immediate plans to increase either its 
staff or its visibility here.  For this reason, he has 
decided not to consult with the Indian government--which is 
widely believed to have discouraged the GON from accepting 
third-party assistance in the past.  As long as the 
assistance remains discreet, he reasoned, the Indians may 
decide to overlook it.  Formally notifying the Indian 
government of the proposed assistance, on the other hand, 
might force the southern neighbor to take a position against 
the plan. 
 
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MAOISTS MAY FULMINATE, 
BUT WON'T QUIT TALKS 
----------------------- 
 
5.  (C)  In his most recent telephone conversation with 
Bhattarai a week earlier, Marshall said that the Maoist 
ideologue was "frothing at the mouth" at perceived 
interference by the US, UK, and India in the June 4 change in 
government.  Despite their displeasure at the change in 
government, the Maoists will not break off dialogue, Marshall 
predicted.  He noted the Maoists' uncharacteristic silence 
after the local press reported that 7 insurgents had been 
killed in a fire fight with the RNA in Jajarkot on June 21 
(septel), speculating that the Maoists were unwilling to 
jeopardize relations with the new goverment by raising an 
outcry.  When poloff asked why the Maoists were so angry at a 
change that swapped one royally appointed National Democratic 
Party leader for another, Marshall replied that the Maoists 
fear that the new government will renege on commitments made 
by the Chand governent in the two previous rounds.  He cited 
the 5-km restriction on the RNA and an as-yet unfulfilled 
promise to release all Maoist Central Committee members as 
examples.  Bhattarai remains especially incensed at the USG, 
and continually raises the placement of the Maoists on a 
watchlist in the annual terrorism report as evidence of US 
enmity.  The Maoists truly cannot understand the USG refusal 
to "get over" the murders of  two locally employed Embassy 
guards, Marshall said, indicating that the Maoists believe 
that their admission of responsibility and characterization 
of the executions as mistakes should have been sufficient to 
clear the air.  Poloff said that the USG is seeking justice 
for the two slayings, as well as an end to extortion of US 
businesses, and will not "get over" anything until progress 
is demonstrated on these fronts.  Marshall said he 
understands the US view. 
 
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SECRETARIAT SET UP; 
 
SIPDIS 
NOT YET READY TO GO 
--------------------- 
 
6.  (SBU)  On June 26 emboffs met with Janak Raj Joshi, Joint 
Secretary at the 10-day-old Peace Secretariat, which was set 
 
SIPDIS 
up by Prime Minister Surya Bahadur Thapa as one of his first 
acts in office.  Joshi, who is currently "squatting" at the 
Ministry of Population and Environment, said he is spending 
most of his time now hiring additional staff members and 
securing suitable office space.  Joshi said he meets with the 
two members of the GON's newest talk team (Ref A) on a daily 
basis.  He has not, however, yet met with the four 
facilitators who participated in the two previous rounds, nor 
with the six members of the previous GON negotiating team. 
He acknowledged that neither side apparently had kept minutes 
of the two previous sessions, making his own task of picking 
up where the last round ended significantly more difficult. 
 
 
7.  (SBU)  The terms of reference for the Secretariat task it 
with six areas of responsibility.  First, the Secretariat is 
charged with "implementation" of all decisions made during 
the talks.  Second, it is to provide negotiators with 
"advice, information and documents" related to the conduct of 
the negotiations.  Joshi said that documenting alleged 
violations of the code of conduct would be an example of a 
duty under this rubric.  Third, the Secretariat is 
responsible for "research and development," i.e., hiring 
consultants and experts and/or developing a "road map" for 
the peace process.  Fourth, the Secretariat will document 
each round of negotiations (a marked departure from past 
practice).  Fifth, it is responsible for "generic 
coordination" with NGOs, civil society, and the donor 
community.  Sixth, it will act as the talk team's media 
liaison.  (Note:  A wire diagram outlining the Secretariat's 
organizational structure has been e-mailed to SA/INS.  End 
note.) 
 
8.  (SBU)  Poloff asked about possible Secretariat plans to 
hire consultants and experts.  Joshi emphasized that the GON 
has not yet decided whether to solicit outside assistance, 
adding that any experts or consultants needed might be 
locally hired.  "We have to be careful of outside influence," 
he noted, but added that assistance from a multilateral, 
neutral organization could be more politically acceptable. 
 
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COMMENT 
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9.  (C) With Prime Minister Thapa still trying to urge 
political parties to join his half-full Cabinet and with only 
two members of a talk team appointed, the GON is unlikely to 
be re-open formal negotiations very soon.  However much the 
Maoists may complain that the change in government is 
delaying progress, the hiatus between rounds of dialogue 
offers a valuable window of opportunity for the GON to 
receive some desperately needed aid in preparing for 
negotiations.  Despite its obvious need, the GON had 
previously parried all offers of negotiation assistance from 
donors eager to assist the peace process with polite refusals 
that usually contained some reference to "regional 
sensitivities" (Nepali-speak for India).  It is difficult to 
determine whether the GON has overcome its reservations and 
decided to accept some quiet, low-profile assistance, or 
whether Information Minister Thapa, who has apparently been 
on cordial terms with Marshall for some time, simply could 
not bring himself to refuse the offer outright.  The Embassy 
will follow up with the resident HD staff member and with 
others in the GON to learn if the government has changed its 
attitude toward third-party assistance in the peace process. 
 
MALINOWSKI