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NEPAL: Two recent incidents involving threats to a Teachers' Union leader and the re-arrest of citizens despite Supreme Court release orders

June 21, 2005

URGENT ACTION URGENT ACTION URGENT ACTION URGENT ACTION

ASIAN HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION – URGENT APPEAL PROGRAMME

21 June 2005
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UA-99-2005: NEPAL: Two recent incidents involving threats to a Teachers' Union leader and the re-arrest of citizens despite Supreme Court release orders

NEPAL: Death threats to human rights activists; Systemic re-arrest of the civilians
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Dear friends,

The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHFC) has received information from a reliable source regarding two separate incidents of human rights abuse in Nepal. The first incident relates to threats being made by Maoists against Headmaster and President of the Nepal Teachers' Union Kaski Branch, Mr. Dipak Poudel. Mr. Poudel has been threatened with physical harm if he does not resign from his Union post. It is alleged that Mr. Poudel has been placed on a 'death list' by Maoist groups. In the second incident, two men, Mr. Karma Bahadur Magar and Mr. Bablu Tamang, were immediately re-arrested by security forces, despite Supreme Court orders granting their release.

In light of these incidents, we ask you to intervene immediately. In the first incident, please ask relevant authorities to take immediate steps to ensure the safety of Mr. Poudel. Mr. Poudel must be free to carry out his duties without fear of physical harm or the possibility of death. In the second incident, both men must be released as soon as possible and not be detained again. A full investigation must be conducted into why their re-arrests occurred and who authorised this action. The general re-arrest of civilians in Nepal, despite Supreme Court release orders, must be stopped immediately.

Urgent Appeals Desk
Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC)
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DETAILED INFORMATION:

Incident one
Name of victim: Mr. Dipak Poudel, 50, the headmaster of Bharatibhawan Secondary School and the president of Nepal Teachers' Union, Kaski Branch
Perpetrators: Maoists

On 18 May 2005, the Maoists issued an open letter to Mr. Dipak Poudel threatening him to resign from his post as president of the Nepal Teachers Union, Kaski Branch. In the letter they provided several reasons as to why Mr. Poudel must step down immediately.

As a district level leader and activist of the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist), Mr. Poudel has been working with the teachers' union for the past seven years and has in recent times been increasingly exposed to physical threats. Despite these threats and the letter of May 18, Mr. Poudel refuses to resign. He maintains that he has done no wrong and committed no mistakes in his role within the union. He adamantly opposes the Maoists' actions, which he says are the direct result of his school refusing to provide donations to their cause.

There has been a gradual growth of killings by Maoists against local citizens in recent days. Earlier, Maoists killed Cheetra Bahadur K.C., the Kaski district president of Rastryiya Prajatantra Party (RPP) and Ganesh Man Palikhe, Campus Chief of Janpriya Multiple Campus.  According to some locals, the Maoists have prepared a list of some six people to be killed. Among them, Mr. Poudel has been listed.


Incident two
Victims: Mr. Karna Bahadur Magar, 35, resident of Danda Kharka Village Development Committee (VDC)-2, Dolkha District and Mr. Bablue Tamang of Chandol, Kathmandu Metropolis-4
Perpetrators: Nepalese security forces

On 1 June 2005, the Supreme Court issued a release order for Mr. Karna Bahadur Magar, stating that his prior detention was illegal. However, when Mr. Magar was presented to the court on June 8, having yet to be released, he was arrested once again before even leaving the court premises. At the time of the re-arrest, security forces also charged other persons who tried to intervene on behalf of Mr. Magar, including Mr. Bal Krishna Poudel, 35, of Dandabari VDC-1, a relative of Mr. Magar.

Separately, Mr. Bablu Tamang was re-arrested on the court premises on 2 June 2005. The Supreme Court issued an order for his release on 26 May finding his arrest to be illegal. He was finally brought to the district court on June 2, in defiance of the Supreme Court order. However, Mr. Tamang was re-arrested before he left the court on that same day.

The re-arrests of Mr. Magar and Mr. Tamang exemplify the all too frequent defiance by the security forces of court orders for the release of citizens. To view similar cases that the AHRC has reported on previously, please click on the following: UA-127-2004, UA-95-2004, UA-86-2004, UP-38-2004, UA-74-2004, UA-51-2004.


SUGGESTED ACTION:
Please send a letter to the following relevant authorities voicing your serious concern regarding these incidents.

Sample letter:

Dear ___________,

NEPAL: Two recent incidents involving threats to a Teachers' Union leader and the re-arrest of citizens despite Supreme Court release orders

I write to voice my concern about two recent incidents in Nepal involving physical threats to a Teachers' Union leader and the re-arrest of citizens despite Supreme Court orders granting their release.

In the first incident, threats by Maoists have been made against the school headmaster and president of the Nepal Teachers' Union Kaski Branch, Mr. Dipak Poudel. Mr. Poudel has received a written letter and warnings that if he does not resign from his Union post, he will come to physical harm. He believes that these threats are a result of his school not providing donations to the Maoist groups. It is also alleged that Mr. Poudel's name is placed on a 'death list' by these groups. 

In the second incident, two men, Mr. Karma Bahadur Magar and Mr. Bablu Tamang, were immediately re-arrested by Nepalese security forces, despite Supreme Court release orders.  On 1 June 2005, the Supreme Court issued a release order for Mr. Magar, stating that his prior detention was illegal. However, Mr. Magar was arrested once again on June 8 before even leaving the court premises. At the time of the re-arrest, security forces also charged other persons who tried to intervene on behalf of Mr. Magar, including Mr. Bal Krishna Poudel, 35, of Dandabari VDC-1, a relative of Mr. Magar. As for Mr. Bablu Tamang, he was re-arrested on the court premises on 2 June 2005 despite the Supreme Court's release order issued on May 26.

The re-arrests of Mr. Magar and Mr. Tamang exemplify the all too frequent act of Nepalese security forces defying court orders for the release of citizens in Nepal.

In light of these incidents, I urge you to take immediate steps to ensure the safety of Mr. Poudel. In the second incident, both Mr. Magar and Mr. Tamang must be released immediately in accordance with the Supreme Court orders and not be detained again. A full investigation must be conducted into why their re-arrests occurred and who authorized this action. I also urge the government of Nepal to stop re-arresting people and abusing the process of law.

I look for your urgent intervention in these matters.

Yours sincerely,


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PLEASE SEND A LETTER TO:

1. Ian Martin
Chief of mission
UN House, Pulchowk,
Kathmandu, Nepal.
Tel : (977) 1 5524 366 or 5523 200
Fax : (977) 1 5523 991 or 5523 986
Email : registry-OHCHR@undp.org

2. His Majesty King Gyanendra
Narayanhity Royal Palace
Durbar Marg
Kathmandu
NEPAL
Tel: 977 14 413577/227577
Fax: 977 14 227395/ 411955

3. Major General Sharma Thappa
Attn: Officer of Royal Nepal Army Human Rights Cell
Human Rights Cell
Singha Durbar
Kathmandu
NEPAL
Telefax: + 977 14 245 020/226 292

4. Mr. Mahadeo Prasad Yadav
Attorney General
Office of the Attorney General
Ramshahpath, Kathmandu
NEPAL
Tel: +977 14 262548 (direct line)/262394 (through Personal Assistant)
Fax: +977 14 262582
Email: fpattorney@most.gov.np 

5. Mr. Nain Bahadur Khatri
Chairman of the National Human Rights Commission
Pulchowck, Lalitpur
NEPAL
Tel: +977 1 5 547 974 or 525 659 or 547 975
Fax: +9771 5 547 973
Email: nhrc@ntc.net.np 

6. Ms Manuela Carmema Castrillo
Working group on arbitrary detention
C/o OHCHR-UNOG,
1211 Geneva 10
SWITZERLAND
Fax: +41 22 917 9006


Thank you.

Urgent Appeals Programme
Asian Human Rights Commission
Document Type :
Urgent Appeal Case
Document ID :
UA-99-2005
Countries :
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Extended Introduction: Urgent Appeals, theory and practice

A need for dialogue

Many people across Asia are frustrated by the widespread lack of respect for human rights in their countries.  Some may be unhappy about the limitations on the freedom of expression or restrictions on privacy, while some are affected by police brutality and military killings.  Many others are frustrated with the absence of rights on labour issues, the environment, gender and the like. 

Yet the expression of this frustration tends to stay firmly in the private sphere.  People complain among friends and family and within their social circles, but often on a low profile basis. This kind of public discourse is not usually an effective measure of the situation in a country because it is so hard to monitor. 

Though the media may cover the issues in a broad manner they rarely broadcast the private fears and anxieties of the average person.  And along with censorship – a common blight in Asia – there is also often a conscious attempt in the media to reflect a positive or at least sober mood at home, where expressions of domestic malcontent are discouraged as unfashionably unpatriotic. Talking about issues like torture is rarely encouraged in the public realm.

There may also be unwritten, possibly unconscious social taboos that stop the public reflection of private grievances.  Where authoritarian control is tight, sophisticated strategies are put into play by equally sophisticated media practices to keep complaints out of the public space, sometimes very subtly.  In other places an inner consensus is influenced by the privileged section of a society, which can control social expression of those less fortunate.  Moral and ethical qualms can also be an obstacle.

In this way, causes for complaint go unaddressed, un-discussed and unresolved and oppression in its many forms, self perpetuates.  For any action to arise out of private frustration, people need ways to get these issues into the public sphere.

Changing society

In the past bridging this gap was a formidable task; it relied on channels of public expression that required money and were therefore controlled by investors.  Printing presses were expensive, which blocked the gate to expression to anyone without money.  Except in times of revolution the media in Asia has tended to serve the well-off and sideline or misrepresent the poor.

Still, thanks to the IT revolution it is now possible to communicate with large audiences at little cost.  In this situation there is a real avenue for taking issues from private to public, regardless of the class or caste of the individual.

Practical action

The AHRC Urgent Appeals system was created to give a voice to those affected by human rights violations, and by doing so, to create a network of support and open avenues for action.  If X’s freedom of expression is denied, if Y is tortured by someone in power or if Z finds his or her labour rights abused, the incident can be swiftly and effectively broadcast and dealt with. The resulting solidarity can lead to action, resolution and change. And as more people understand their rights and follow suit, as the human rights consciousness grows, change happens faster. The Internet has become one of the human rights community’s most powerful tools.   

At the core of the Urgent Appeals Program is the recording of human rights violations at a grass roots level with objectivity, sympathy and competence. Our information is firstly gathered on the ground, close to the victim of the violation, and is then broadcast by a team of advocates, who can apply decades of experience in the field and a working knowledge of the international human rights arena. The flow of information – due to domestic restrictions – often goes from the source and out to the international community via our program, which then builds a pressure for action that steadily makes its way back to the source through his or her own government.   However these cases in bulk create a narrative – and this is most important aspect of our program. As noted by Sri Lankan human rights lawyer and director of the Asian Human Rights Commission, Basil Fernando:

"The urgent appeal introduces narrative as the driving force for social change. This idea was well expressed in the film Amistad, regarding the issue of slavery. The old man in the film, former president and lawyer, states that to resolve this historical problem it is very essential to know the narrative of the people. It was on this basis that a court case is conducted later. The AHRC establishes the narrative of human rights violations through the urgent appeals. If the narrative is right, the organisation will be doing all right."

Patterns start to emerge as violations are documented across the continent, allowing us to take a more authoritative, systemic response, and to pinpoint the systems within each country that are breaking down. This way we are able to discover and explain why and how violations take place, and how they can most effectively be addressed. On this path, larger audiences have opened up to us and become involved: international NGOs and think tanks, national human rights commissions and United Nations bodies.  The program and its coordinators have become a well-used tool for the international media and for human rights education programs. All this helps pave the way for radical reforms to improve, protect and to promote human rights in the region.