KATHMANDU, March 31 - Minister for Information and Communications Krishna Bahadur Mahara said on Tuesday that the Nepal government will take fresh initiatives to return Bhutanese refugees to their homeland.
“The government has not taken strong enough initiatives for the return of refugees to their homeland,” said Mahara at a book-launch in Kathmandu on Tuesday.
Exiled Bhutanese leader Tek Nath Rijal expressed concern over Nepal government's apathy toward the plight of Bhutanese refugees. “Refugees are being settled in third countries, but Nepal government has not taken any recent initiative for refugees seeking to go back to Bhutan,” said Rijal. According to him, third country resettlement and repatriation should go side by side.
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Minister Mahara and Rijal jointly launched ‘Becoming a Journalist in Exile’, a book edited by T.P. Mishra, a Bhutanese journalist in Nepal. Commenting on the book, journalist Dhrubahari Adhikary lauded Mishra’s effort. The book talks about the situation of journalism under the autocratic Bhutanese regime, and the struggle of exiled Bhutanese journalists in Nepal.
There are more than 100,000 Bhutanese refugees languishing in seven UNHCHR-run refugee camps in Morang and Jhapa districts. Some western countries including the USA, Canada and Australia are resettling Bhutanese refugees.
Posted on: 2009-03-31 20:04:44 (Server Time)
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