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KATHMANDU : Scores of people protesting abuse at the hands of Maoists and asking for food and shelter from the government were arrested by security forces in the Nepalese capital Thursday, witnesses and police said.
The protestors, members of the Maoist Victims Association, came from makeshift camps in the city and were arrested after a silent protest march near the royal palace where they planned to plead for food and shelter, witnesses and police said.
"Over 50 Maoist victims out of 100 who protested, were nabbed as soon as they came out of their makeshift camps in the open air theatre in Kathmandu, identified as restricted area by the government where anti-king protests are banned," a witness said.
Police put the number arrested at nearer 40.
The brief demonstration Thursday evening blocked traffic on one of Kathmandu's busiest roads about 300 metres (990 feet) from the royal palace of King Gyanendra who seized power and suspended civil liberties more than three months ago.
Police broke up the protest and dragged off demonstrators, including women, into five waiting security vans, witnesses said.
"The government is indifferent towards our problem," said Hem Karki, a 58-year-old from Ramechhap in the far east of Nepal.
"I was forced to flee my home after the Maoists took me away into a jungle and broke my right arm and right leg three years ago," he said.
Karki said he is living in a temporary camp with eight family members.
The chairman of the association, Dharma Raj Neupane, said the government should provide food and shelter for the victims from surplus stocks.
"Tons of rice is rotting" inside government warehouses "while displaced people have nothing to eat," Neupane said.
Maoist rebels have been fighting for a communist republic in Nepal since 1996 in a conflict that has claimed over 11,000 lives.
The conflict has forced thousands of families to flee from eastern and western Nepal areas controlled by the rebels to the capital where they are now living in camps.
- AFP /ls
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