Last Updated: Wednesday, 24 January 2007
UN urges Nepal war crimes trials http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6294869.stm
[Both Maoists and troops have been blamed for human rights abuses]
The UN's top human rights official has called for troops and former Maoist rebels to be prosecuted for human rights abuses during Nepal's civil war.
Speaking after a six-day visit to the country, Louise Arbour told the BBC war crimes had been committed in Nepal.
At least 13,000 people were killed and hundreds went missing in the conflict.
The Maoists agreed to peace last year and are set to join a multi-party government. The parties and the Maoists say they will form a truth commission.
The BBC's Charles Haviland in Kathmandu says Ms Arbour's message is that severe human rights violations in Nepal in the past and present are made more likely by impunity, or what she called very poor law enforcement.
'Genocide'
In her BBC interview, Ms Arbour accused the country's political players of acting insultingly to victims of rights abuses committed during nearly 11 years of conflict.
[There is no prospect for sustainable peace without the personal accountability of those who have perpetrated these abuses
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour]
She welcomed moves to set up a truth commission, but said it would be catastrophic to grant amnesties on either side before the commission did its work.
"The UN totally rejects any amnesties for very serious offences - genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity - and certainly war crimes here would be clearly applicable," she told the BBC.
She made clear at a news conference that people on both sides should be punished.
"There should be prosecutions of those most responsible for these levels of gross violations of human rights, disappearances, killings, and torture," the UN high commissioner for human rights told reporters in Kathmandu.
Ms Arbour also expressed "great concern" for the recent violence in the south-eastern town of Lahan, where five people, including a 16-year-old boy, have been killed in unrest since Friday.
Since a ceasefire between the Maoists and security forces began last April there has been only one inquiry commission that has allocated blame.
It pronounced King Gyanendra and 200 other people responsible for suppressing the huge April demonstrations in which more than 20 people died and thousands were injured.