The two sides reached an agreement to appoint one nodal officer each at the District Administration Office, Border Security Posts, and District Police Office in all bordering districts to share intelligence information with their counterparts on real time basis during the Home Secretary level meeting held in Kathmandu Saturday. The appointment of nodal officers is expected to effectively curb crime along the border, enabling police personnel on both sides of the border to act promptly. [break]
The day-long meeting discussed ways to curb cross border crimes, human trafficking, fake Indian currency smuggling, trafficking of narcotics and psychotropic substances along the Indo-Nepal border. "The meeting has given emphasis on effective coordination and exchange of information at ground level between Armed Police Force and its Indian counterpart Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB) along the bordering districts," said a Nepali participant in the meeting.
The meeting in which Home Secretary Nabin Ghimire led the Nepali team and his Indian counterpart R K Singh led the Indian team has agreed to hold Border District Coordination Committee (BDCC) meetings every three months on a regular basis and sort out the problems seen in the bordering areas at local level. Though the two sides had earlier reached an agreement to hold such meeting as and when required, the BDCC meeting has not taken place for several months.
Among other things, the BDCC meeting will oversee if the border pillars are missing, maintain the pillars and take necessary measures to disallow encroachment in the ´no man´s land´. The misuse of mobile SIM cards by the service providers also surfaced as one of the important agenda items at the meeting as criminals are increasingly found using SIM cards for cross border criminal activities.
Nepali participants said terrorist activities and ´religious fundamentalism´ along the border areas was one of the important concerns raised by the Indian side at the meeting. Both the sides have agreed to increase vigilance along the border and increase security cooperation to thwart any such untoward incidents in future, Nepali officials present in the meeting said. Indian side will also increase the number of SSB posts along the border to curb such activities.
Indian side stressed the need to increase further surveillance and security cooperation to curb smuggling of fake Indian currency as Nepal shares open border with India. Indian side maintained that a strong and concerted action was needed as smugglers had increasingly chosen Nepal to pump in fake Indian currency in India market by misusing the open border.
According to a press statement issued after the meeting, the Indian side has agreed to help enhance the capacity of Armed Police Force (APF), provide training to Nepal Police personnel, immigration and prison officials, and chief districts officers (CDOs). India will take Nepali CDOs to India on observation tours.
The 13-member Indian delegation on Sunday left for the lake city of Pokhara and will return home on Monday. Earlier, Indian Home Secretary Singh also paid courtesy call to Minister for Home and Foreign Affairs Madhav Prasad Ghimire.
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