 New
York, August 26, 2002—The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ)
condemns the brutal murder by Maoist rebels of Nava Raj Sharma, editor
of the Nepali-language weekly Kadam, published from Kalikot District
in Nepal's remote Midwestern region.
News of Sharma's murder earlier this summer surfaced only last week,
after a team of journalists and human rights activists organized by the
government's National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) visited Kalikot and
other districts in the area.
Nepal's Maoist rebels, who have been fighting a guerrilla war since 1996
to overthrow the constitutional monarchy, control portions of the country,
including much of Kalikot and neighboring districts. Violence has escalated
since November 26, 2001, when the government imposed a state of emergency
in response to a rebel offensive and ordered the Royal Nepal Army to fight
the insurgents.
Maoist rebels kidnapped Sharma on June 1 in the village
of Syuna, in Kalikot, said members of the NHRC team who spoke to local
residents and police in the district. According to the national English-language
newspaper The Kathmandu Post, police recovered Sharma's badly mutilated
body from the area in mid-August. Rebels had gouged out his eyes, cut
his hands and legs, and shot him in the chest, police told the NHRC team.
"The murder of Nava Raj Sharma is both a tragedy and a terrible outrage,"
said CPJ executive director Ann Cooper. "All parties to this conflict
have an obligation under international humanitarian law to protect the
lives of journalists and other noncombatants."
Sharma, who lived in the village of Sipkhana, which is adjacent to Syuna,
was known as an independent journalist. He had been working at Kadam
since 1998, and was formerly the editor of the local newspaper Karnali
Sandesh, according to the Kathmandu-based Center for Human Rights
and Democratic Studies (CEHURDES). A representative from CEHURDES was
part of the NHRC team that visited the area.
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