Fears that new constitution fails to address human rights violations

For the past two years, Debi Sunwar has been desperately waiting for justice after the extrajudicial execution of her 15-year old daughter, Maina, who was illegally detained, raped, tortured and killed in February 2004 by the Nepalese Army.

The case has been documented by Advocacy Forum (AF), a local human rights NGO, which has been pursuing hundreds of cases of impunity in the Himalayan nation and says nobody has been punished for that killing and hundreds of others.

"Where is the justice for my daughter?" asked Sunwar, who has been campaigning through the local media and activists with support of the NGO to punish her daughter's killers - but in vain.

And there are thousands of similar cases, with many people trying to find justice for relatives killed by the security forces and the Maoist rebels during the decade-long armed conflict, which has claimed the lives of more than 14,000 Nepalis, according to AF.

According to the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) in Nepal and the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), not a single case has been tried in the courts and no one has been punished for such crimes.

More than 800 cases of extrajudicial executions have been recorded by AF alone over the past five years. Between July 2005 and June 2006, the group documented 86 cases of extrajudicial killings by the security forces and 81 by the Maoists.

It also recorded cases of rape by the security forces, the anti-Maoist vigilante groups and the Maoists. According to its report, young girls and elderly women had been 'categorical targets' of security forces.

"Neither the government nor the Maoists has shown any interest to investigate and punish the perpetrators," said Nepal's prominent human rights lawyer, Mandira Sharma.

Now fears are growing that such crimes against humanity committed during the period of conflict will never be punished as a new interim constitution, which gives blanket amnesty to those who have violated human rights, comes into force on 15 January.

In November, the Maoist rebels and interim government of seven national parties signed a historic peace agreement to end the armed conflict. One of the key developments was to frame a new interim constitution as well as manage the weapons and armies of both the People's Liberation Army of the Maoists and the Nepalese Army of the state.

Neither the interim government nor the Maoists would comment on the interim constitution or impunity.

Many families whose children and relatives were victims of extra-judicial killings and brutal executions during the conflict period will fail to get justice due to the new constitution, which will give amnesty to the perpetrators, explained Sharma.

"All these years of our risk and efforts to find justice for the victims against these perpetrators will just be in vain," said Sharma.

Activists say that their only hope is the visit of the UN's High Commissioner for Human Rights, Louise Arbour, comes to Nepal on 19 January and they are appealing that Arbour has to address the issue of impunity strongly with both the state and the Maoists.

nn/sz/mw