Nepal parties call general strike against killings

KATHMANDU - An alliance of Nepal's seven main political parties have called for a general strike in Kathmandu to protest against the killing of 12 civilians by a soldier after a row with villagers.

"We have called on transports, businesses, factories and schools to close to protest the killing of innocent people," Subash Nemwang, a leader of the Communist Party of Nepal-UML, the country's second-biggest party, told Reuters.

Nemwang said the government headed by King Gyanendra, who seized power and fired the government on February 1, was responsible for the deaths of villagers who had gathered near a temple at the tourist town of Nagarkot, about 30km from Kathmandu.

A Nepali soldier killed 11 people and wounded 19 after an argument at about midnight on Wednesday local time. One of the injured died later in hospital.

The army said the soldier also died in the incident.

"The army has taken the incident very seriously and an investigation has been ordered," the army said in a statement.

State television said the government would pay for hospital treatment and pay US$2000 ($2864) in compensation for each of the dead.

Nemwang said the parties planned to organise protest rallies in the hill-ringed capital of 1.5 million people tomorrow.

The strike call came as thousands of people marched through the streets of Kathmandu in a protest against the king which turned into a show of solidarity for the relatives of those killed at the tourist resort of Nagarkot.

Nearer the site of the killings, 2000 people, including relatives and friends of the victims, burned tyres and protested.

"You can't just kill people," they shouted outside a hospital where the bodies of the victims were taken for post-mortem examinations.

Dozens of riot police stood guard as relatives waited to receive the bodies.

"I heard the sound of bullets as I was preparing to sleep. I was terribly scared," Sohan Shrestha, who had come to collect the body of his son, said at the hospital, tears rolling down his cheeks.

Witnesses said the villagers had gathered to mark the full moon on Wednesday at the temple on a hilly terrace.

"Bloodstains littered the entire temple," journalist Deepak Rijal said after visiting the site. "The villagers are terrified."

Human rights groups say the poorly trained Nepali army regularly commits human rights abuses in its battle to quell a Maoist rebellion.

More than 12,500 people have died in the anti-monarchy conflict, which has also shattered Nepal's aid- and tourist-dependent economy.

- REUTERS