Chandragadi, Jhapa, Jan.29: Nepalese and Bhutanese officials who have gathered here decided today to begin the verification of Bhutanese refugees in one of the camps in this district on third week of February (between Feb.18 and 24) next month.

The joint team of the two Himalayan Kingdoms, however, did not reveal which camp they would choose to start the verification process from. “This cannot be made public at this point of time,” said Usha Nepal, Joint Secretary at Home Ministry, who heads the Nepalese side in the Joint Verification Team (JVT) of Nepal and Bhutan.

Nepal also said that it was still not clear how long would it take to finish the verification in the camp that would be chosen first. “That we can estimate only after we begin the verification process in the field.”

She said that the officials from both the sides agreed to sort out any difference, if it cops up during the verification process, at the ministerial or secretarial level. “The ministerial level could be either the home ministers or the foreign ministers from both the countries.”

The joint team, according to Nepal, also agreed to establish a joint office either at Damak or Birtamod of Jhapa district. If in case both the locations are found unsuitable for the official purpose, the office will be established at Chandragadi, according to the officials in the joint team.

These officials from Nepal and Bhutan arrived here last week to prepare the groundwork and logistics for the verification of the refugees.

After the meeting between the officials of the two sides here today, Joint Secretary Nepal said that the verification would be held in accordance to the agreement between Nepal and Bhutan last month.

The 10th bilateral ministerial level meeting between the two Himalayan Kingdoms last month had ended with an agreement to begin the verification process of the 100,000 Bhutanese refugees who have been languishing in eastern Nepal for the last 10 years.

These Nepali-speaking Bhutanese have been living as refugees in seven UNHCR-maintained camps in this and neighbouring Morang districts.

It was only after 10 rounds of ministerial level talks in the last seven years, Nepal and Bhutan could agree to begin the verification process of the refugees. The two Kingdoms came to an understanding last month to begin the verification process in one of the seven camps.

Before reaching into that agreement, Nepal and Bhutan had serious differences over the verification process as both the sides stuck to their notwithstanding positions on the four categories of refugees. The two countries, during the first round of talks in 1993, had agreed to categorise the refugees into four groups – Bonafide Bhutanese citizens, Bhutanese who have emigrated, Bhutanese who have committed crimes, and Non-Bhutanese.

After the categorisation, Bhutan was adamant that it would take back only category one refugees while Nepal maintained that it could not keep the refugees of the rest three categories because they were not its citizens.

The disagreement on the positions stonewalled the talks until 1998 when Bhutan gradually began to come under tremendous international pressure. After European Community, the United Nations Human Rights Commission and, of late, the United States of America began to voice their concern on Bhutanese refugees, the Dragon Kingdom evidently softened its rigid stand.

After the 10th round of talks here last month, Bhutanese Foreign Minister Jigme Y. Thinley had said that the Joint Verification Team would accept any valid documents from the refugees to prove their citizenship as Bhutanese. The JVT would comprise of five members from Nepal and Bhutan each.