ReportageThe torturous road to democracy—domestic crisis in Nepal
Section snippets
Collapse of democracy
The 1990 revolution brought a new constitution to Nepal and to an expectant population, according to Rajesh Gautam, human rights activist and a historian at Tribhuvan University in Kathmandu. Nepalese people hoped for equal access to power for all, freedom of expression, and the right to form political parties. Although relatively free and open elections have since been regularly held, the changes failed to fulfil the expectations of most Nepalese people, especially in rural areas. The new
Torture
As a signatory to the United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (1984), Nepal acknowledges that torture is:
“Any act by which severe pain or suffering whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted by or at the instigation of a public official on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him/her or a third person, information or confession, punishing him/her for an act he/she has committed or intimidating him/her or another
Treatment
Specialised care of torture victims was not developed until the mid-1980s,11 and successful treatment of survivors in Nepal is further hindered by health-professionals' mainly western-based understanding of the psychiatric effects of torture. Increasing evidence,12 however, suggests that crosscultural understanding of symptoms of torture can be relevant in development of appropriate forms of treatment as long as local contexts are thoroughly understood, and rehabilitation is guided by local
Redress
Recompense by the Nepalese government for torture victims is very rare, and payments are often out-of-court settlements that avoid bringing perpetrators to justice. I have been unable to find any example of the Nepalese police being prosecuted for acts of torture, and the likelihood of change in the near future is slim. One unusually well documented case6, 17 concerned the severe beating and torture of three truck workers who were suspects in a theft of about UK£2500. The story was big enough
Prevention
Prevention is an increasingly important ambition of CVICT, who aim to bring change through litigation, penal reform, and public education. van Ommeren claims that most Nepalese people do not think that torture is a crime. In fact, torture is not a crime in Nepalese domestic law, which thus fails to comply with provisions of the United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (1984). Penal Reform International, the UK Department for
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Political violence and mental health: A multi-disciplinary review of the literature on Nepal
2010, Social Science and MedicineCitation Excerpt :From undocumented armed rebellions against early autocratic rule (Karki & Seddon, 2003), an armed insurrection in 1950, the Jhapa uprising in 1971, to the recent decade-long Maoist insurgency, organized violence has a longer history in Nepal than the Western imaginations of Nepal as Shangri-La would suggest (Gellner, 2003; Metz, 2003). The major situations involving political violence in Nepal are (i) the general use of political violence by state security forces throughout Nepal's history, including torture (Lykke & Timilsena, 2002; Stevenson, 2001) and use of excessive violence (Shrestha, 2007), (ii) the plight of refugees in Nepal from Tibet and Bhutan (Dolma, Singh, Lohfeld, Orbinski, & Mills, 2006; Hutt, 1996), and (iii) the recent decade-long Maoist conflict (1996–2006). Most of the studies identified in this review concerned Bhutanese refugees and the Maoist conflict.
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