The Royal Palace has refuted the allegations that arms were purchased during the official visit of Crown Prince Paras to the Republic of Austria last March.

A press statement issued by the Press Secretariat of His Majesty the King said, “The attention of this Secretariat has been drawn to various reports in sections of the media that arms were purchased during the official visit of His Royal Highness Crown Prince Paras Birr Bikram Shah Dev to the Republic of Austria last March.”

The secretariat has made it clear that the objective of the visit, which took place at the invitation of Dr. Wolfgang Schuessel, Federal Chancellor of the Republic of Austria, was to hand over a pair of rhinoceros gifted by the people of Nepal to the people of Austria.

The secretariat also condemned the media reports on the arms purchase and marked such statements as totally baseless, fabricated and motivated by malicious intent.

The Himalayan Times daily quoted Maoist chairman Prachanda as saying that the sophisticated arms and explosives in an Ukrainian cargo plane which was grounded at the Ahmedabad Airport in India was purchased by Crown Prince Paras from Israel during his Austria visit last year.