Such a mechanism will comprise bureaucrats, ex-army and police personnel and Maoist commanders of respective cantonments, a source at the Technical Committee told myrepublica.com referring to the committee´s report finalized on Sunday on condition of anonymity.
- Civilian mechanisms proposed
- Mechanism to have bureaucrats, ex-army, police and commanders
- Code also finalized
- Maoist flag to be removed from cantonments
- Combatants required to quit party membership
The special committee last Sunday had asked the TC had to offer suggestions on how the Maoist combatants could be brought under its command. The TC was supposed to submit the report on Sunday but could not as Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal, who is the head the special committee, was out of the Valley.
The proposed mechanism will have five to six members, depending on the size of the cantonments where 19,602 Maoist combatants have been staying. There are altogether 28 cantonments supervised by the United Nations Mission in Nepal (UNMIN), the political mission of the United Nations.
Another TC source confirmed that each cantonment would have such a mechanism to be headed by a second or third class gazetted officer. The mechanism will be required to work under the special committee secretariat based in Kathmandu.
“The mechanism will report the activities in each cantonment to the central secretariat on a daily and weekly basis,” said the source.
In the meantime, the eight-member TC, which has representatives from major political parties including the UCPN (Maoist), also finalized the code of conduct for the combatants on Sunday, according to the TC source.
As per the proposed codes, the combatants will have to remove the flag of their party and photographs of Maoist leaders from the cantonments. Similarly, the combatants will have to quit their party membership once the codes get enforced. In addition, the codes stipulate that a combatant can go on a leave only after an approval from the civilian mechanism. Besides, only 12 percent of the total combatants in a particular cantonment can go on a leave at a time, the source said. The codes do not allow transfer and promotion of the combatants until the special committee so decides.
However, the TC´s proposed civilian mechanism and code of conduct will be effective only if the SC approves them. The special committee is responsible for taking decision on supervision and integration of Maoist combatants in security agencies and rehabilitation of the combatants. The management of the combatants is not only at the center of the peace process but also the thorniest issue among the political parties.
kiran@myrepublica.com
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