Govt-NFIN talks inconclusive
Talks between the government and the agitating Nepal Federation of Indigenous Nationalities (NFIN) that began Monday afternoon have ended inconclusively.
Talks were ‘deadlocked’ as NFIN negotiators refused the government team’s request to suspend the ongoing protests carried out by the federation.
Dr Om Gurung, the talks coordinator of the federation, told reporters after the meeting held at the Peace Secretariat in Singha Durbar that agitations would continue while the talks process could move on.
Another NFIN talk team member Prof Krishna Bhattachan informed that the government team was positive about the NFIN demand that preparations to amend the interim constitution be stopped until the dialogue between the government and agitating groups reaches a meaningful stage.
The meeting has been postponed until March 2. Both sides have also agreed to involve talks facilitators from the next meeting.
As per an understanding few days earlier, government’s talk team, which is headed by minister Mahantha Thakur, and the five-member NFIN team sat for formal negotiations around 2 pm today.
The NFIN, the umbrella organisation of indigenous communities, has been carrying out agitations over the past few weeks demanding ethnicity-based federal system, proportional representation of indigenous nationalities in the forthcoming constituent assembly polls and linguistic freedom, among others.
While talks began in the capital, the NFIN continued its general strike in eastern Mechi and Koshi zones today saying that talks with the government and the protest programmes would go simultaneously. nepalnews.com mk Feb 26 07
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