Bhutan should embrace inclusive democracy, says Koirala

Kathmandu. April 16: “I have always been fighting for democracy and human rights, so I can’t budge an inch from the stand I have taken on the Bhutanese-refugee issues,” said former prime minister and NC president Girija Prasad Koirala at a book-release program held for Bhutanese human rights activist Tek Nath Rizal’s book, From Palace to Prison, at Shangri La Hotel on Thursday. Koirala was speaking as the chief guest of the program. [break]



Koirala said he harbored special sentimental and emotional attachments towards the Bhutanese refugees languishing for the past one-an-a-half decades in the UNHCR-administered camps in eastern Nepal.



“No matter where the Bhutanese refugees are resettled, they want to die in their country and for their country,” said Koirala, in an emotional speech.

Koirala said that he had met the former Bhutanese King Jigme Singye Wanchuck a number of times, but that the king had refused to honor the sentiments of the one hundred thousand refugees.



Koirala also mentioned that in 1950 he had entered Bhutan via Kokrajar and had met some prominent Bhutanese leaders to talk about the rights of the Nepalis in Bhutan. While he was there, the Assam State Police Force asked him to leave Bhutan.



In summing up the experiences he has had with the refugees, Koirala shifted to a more optimistic tone. He said that could see a wave of democratic movements soon engulfing the world, and thus Bhutan too would not be spared by this movement. He ended with a show of camaraderie for Bhutan’s leader Tek Nath Rizal. “I am always with Tek Nath Rizal”, said Koirala.



When Koirala ceded the spotlight to senior UML leader Madhav Kumar Nepal, more comments in support of the refugees followed. Nepal said that the ongoing third-country resettlement of the refugees would not halt the democratic movement in Bhutan. Rather, he said, the third-country resettlement plan would only serve to boost the democratic movement there.



He didn’t mince words as he went on turning the screw. “Although Bhutan promulgated a new constitution and consequently held elections to its National Assembly, it has failed to meet the aspirations of the Bhutanese refugees evicted by the Druk regime,” said Nepal. “Unless and until Bhutan takes the refugees back, that country will continue in one way or another to evict the minority. Bhutan must preserve its multilingual and diverse values in order to retain its identity. To do so, it has to first embrace inclusive democratic values.”



In the early 1990s, former king Wangchuck, who abdicated his throne last year, adopted a debhutanising policy, and the government evicted more than one hundred thousand refugees from Bhutan, into West Bengal. The West Bengal state government then dumped the refugees onto Nepali soil. Nepal accepted the refugees on humanitarian grounds and provided them shelter.



But last year, the United States, Australia and other European countries decided to endorse a move that would allow the refugees to resettle in a third country. So far, over 20,000 refugees have been resettled in the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the Netherlands and Denmark.



Besides Koirala and Madhav Kumar Nepal, CP Gajurel, Dr Mohan Lohani and other prominent politicians also attended the function.

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