Maoists, govt failed on HR committments: AI

Amnesty International (AI), a global human rights watchdog, on Wednesday concluded that both the government and the Maoists failed to implement their commitments to human rights in 2006.
"All the agreements signed in course of the talks included human rights commitments. However, many of the pledges were vaguely worded and few had been fully implemented by the end of the year," AI stated in its annual report on Nepal.
The London-based human rights watchdog released its report, Amnesty International Report 2007, Wednesday worldwide simultaneously. In Nepal, AI Chapter made public the report at a program in Kathmandu. The report covers human rights situation of 153 countries, according to AI Nepal Chapter Director Rameshwar Nepal. The report stated that the role of the National Human Rights Commission remained unclear due to the delay in the appointment of commissioners. The posts have remained vacant since July last year.
The marginalized groups were under-represented in the peace process, the report said. "Neither the SPA government nor the CPN (Maoists) leadership included women in their peace talk teams."
AI, in the report, further said that there were reports of unlawful killings, abductions, torture, ill-treatment, extortion, threats and harassments by members of the CPN (M) despite the party's public commitments to respect international human rights standards.
On the state of impunity, the report said the Nepali authorities were reluctant to proceed with criminal investigation into past human rights violations even when detainees' reports were presented by local human rights defenders and the OHCHR. "Neither the security forces nor the CPN (M) took concrete steps to strengthen accountability within their ranks," the report stated.
Similarly, widows and single women were particularly at risk of violence and harassment last year, according to the report.