KATHMANDU: The Election Commission (EC) today decided to register the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist Leninist).

A meeting of the EC today decided to register the CPN-UML, according to Election Commission Spokesperson Raj Kumar Shrestha.

Sandhya Tiwari of Morang, who is considered close to Prime Minister KP Oli, had applied for registration at the EC on June 26.

Shrestha said that the EC will issue the certificate of party registration to the concerned people after publishing it in the Nepal Gazette.

The CPN-UML had earlier registered ‘Sun’ rising from hills as its election symbol. It should be noted that Sun is the election symbol of the ruling Nepal Communist Party.

The application for the party registration had become controversial with the NCP Chairman and the disgruntled faction of the ruling party alleging PM Oli for registering the party, which Oli had denied.