About 3,000 M-16 rifles given by the US government to the Royal Nepal Army as cooperation arrived in Kathmandu Sunday, RSS reported quoting a highly placed source in the army. The US had agreed to provide the rifles during the tenure of erstwhile Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba.

The US has promised to supply 5,000 M-16 rifles as per the agreement. Nepal is also waiting to receive the first consignment of the 5,500 Minimi rifles from Belgium. The first consignment of 500 rifles was held up in Kazakhstan in the absence of permission from India to use its air space to fly the

weapons over to Nepal.

India has already granted permission to fly over the weapons. The weapons should be arriving at any moment. The Royal Nepal Army and the Armed Police have been using traditional weapons like SLR to check terrorism in different parts of the country. The RNA has also been using the light machine guns. With the arrival of the M-16 rifles, it is widely perceived that the RNA will be better equipped to

counter terrorism.