Two decades of CPA: families of the disappeared still await truth and justice

Kathmandu: Two decades have passed since the end of the 10-year armed conflict through the Comprehensive Peace Accord (CPA), yet the truth surrounding the enforced disappearances and justice for the affected remain elusive, complain the stakeholders concerned.

They stressed the need to realise the sensitivity of the issue and address it through effective coordination among the relevant bodies.

At a programme organised here on Wednesday, marking the memorial day of Bipin Bhandari, who was forcibly arrested and disappeared by security agencies on June 17, 2002, the stakeholders concerned stressed that justice matters to the disappeared people and their families, and it should be the top priority of the State. “The matter must be addressed with utmost priority,” they asserted.

Bhandari, who was 21 years old at the time, was a student leader affiliated with the then-rebel CPN (Maoist). Along with him, Dil Bahadur Rai, Ramhari Rupakheti, Krishna Bahadur Basnet, and Devraj Paudel had been apprehended and disappeared.

The whereabouts of around 1,300 people reportedly subjected to enforced disappearance by the state side are still unknown.

At the programme, Bipin’s father and constitutional law expert, Ekraj Bhandari, accused the State and the successive governments of continuing to overlook the suffering, pain, voices and concerns of the families of the disappeared.

Nepal Communist Party (Bahumat)’s Deepak Chalaune was of the view that though the CPA had raised high hopes for new political and cultural transformation in the country, those expectations remain largely unfulfilled. According to him, the roles and sacrifices of those who contributed to the armed conflict have not been well acknowledged.

Maila Lama of CPN (Maoist) urged the State and the government to continue the search for the missing, and Nepal Communist Party’s senior leader Pampha Bhusal echoed the need for political dialogue and unification among the leftist forces to address the remaining conflict-era issues.

Secretary of the Commission for the Investigation on Enforced Disappeared Persons, Dhruba Kumar Chauan, said that effective coordination among all stakeholders is essential to find the truth and ensure justice for the disappeared and their families. RSS