KATHMANDU: The Rastriya Ekta Abhiyan has handed over a memorandum to the European Union drawing the latter’s attention to China’s encroachment on Nepal’s land.
Chairman of the Abhiyan Vinay Yadav reached the European Union office in Kathmandu on Friday and handed over the memorandum to Stephen McCann, deputy-head of the European delegation for Nepal.
Rastriya Ekta Abhiyan has been continuously conducting various campaigns against Chinese encroachment in Nepal in a democratic and legal manner.
The campaign urged the international community to play a role in resolving Nepal’s problems with China.
The memorandum submitted to EU demanded that China withdraw from the encroached land, that the Nepalese and Chinese governments jointly inspect the border under the supervision of the international community, and that both the government and the international community keep a record of all border posts with GPS.
The Abhiyan has sent the memorandum to the US Embassy in Kathmandu, representatives of the European Union in Nepal, the Russian Embassy in Kathmandu, the Chinese Embassy and the Indian Embassy.
The government had earlier formed a committee under the coordination of Home Ministry Joint Secretary Jaya Narayan Acharya to study the dispute over the Nepal-China border in Humla district last year.
The Acharya committee’s report noted that the Chinese side encroached the border and suggested that the two sides work together to resolve the issue.
Nepal government has not made the report public yet. The report is currently pending at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Chinese side is found to have encroached the border more openly during then KP Oli-led government. But then-Foreign Minister Pradeep Kumar Gyawali, referring to a study done in 2016, said the structures were built on Chinese soil.
Similarly, the Chinese Embassy in Kathmandu had claimed that the structures were constructed in its own territory and there was no border dispute between Nepal and China.
However, the then main opposition party, the Nepali Congress (NC), issued a statement accusing the government of trying to cover up the border despite evidence that it had crossed the line. Interestingly, although NC President Sher Bahadur Deuba-led government formed the committee to study about the Chinese encroachment, the government has not made the report public yet.
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