Nepal Declares Truce With Rebels

Deal Fulfills Parties' Pledge to Seek an End to the Insurgency

KATHMANDU, Nepal, May 3 -- Less than a week after taking power, Nepal's new government on Wednesday declared a cease-fire with Maoist rebels and said it would no longer call them terrorists, the latest in a series of moves aimed at coaxing the guerrillas back into the political mainstream.

The cease-fire added to the sense of political momentum that has been building in Nepal since violent protests last week forced King Gyanendra to reinstate parliament as a first step toward writing a new constitution that could weaken or eliminate the monarchy.

The announcement, made after a cabinet meeting led by Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala, follows the declaration of a three-month-long truce last week by the Maoists. Their 10-year fight to topple the monarchy has cost more than 12,000 lives and driven the Himalayan nation to the brink of economic ruin.

Besides the cease-fire announced yesterday, the new government has moved toward releasing imprisoned Maoists and has been in touch with the movement's underground political leaders, who are likely to make public appearances "very soon," Home Minister Krishna Sitaul told reporters after the cabinet meeting. The government also has decided to seek the lifting of Interpol arrest warrants against rebel leaders, officials said.

"With these decisions, the country has entered the path toward total democracy and lasting peace," Sitaul said.

Gyanendra seized absolute power in February 2005, saying the move was necessary to crush the insurgency. But after weeks of recent protests in which at least 17 people died, he capitulated last week to an alliance of seven opposition political parties and agreed to reinstate parliament, which he had dissolved in 2002.

In moving so quickly to declare a cease-fire, political party leaders made good on promises to try as soon as they regained power to strike a deal to end the insurgency. On Sunday, members of the reconvened parliament fulfilled a major demand of the Maoists when they agreed by unanimous voice vote to hold elections for a constituent assembly that would write a new constitution.

Although the parties have not explicitly called for an end to Nepal's monarchy, which dates to 1769, that is the goal of the Maoists and many of the young Nepalis who swelled the ranks of last month's demonstrations, and it could be the outcome of the process the parliament has set in motion.

During a visit to Kathmandu on Wednesday, Richard A. Boucher, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for South Asia, told reporters that the United States would support the dissolution of the monarchy if that was the outcome of the constituent assembly. "The people want to make sure the king is not able to interfere anymore in the political process," said Boucher, adding that the chief of Nepal's army, Pyar Jung Thapa, had assured him that the military would respect civilian authority.

He said the United States was not ready to remove the Maoists from its list of terrorist groups. "They killed people," he said. "They extorted money. So our removing them from the terrorist list is not going to happen until they stop that behavior."

Deputy Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli told reporters Wednesday that soldiers would "go back to their barracks" and that both sides would abide by normal cease-fire rules. During peace negotiations in 2001 and 2003, the army and the Maoists also observed truces, but they resumed fighting when negotiations failed.