In a bid to pressurize the Bhutanese government to take back its citizens living as refugees in several camps in eastern Nepal since 1991, the Bhutanese community in the Netherlands organized a daylong silent protest on Monday coinciding with the visit of Bhutanese Foreign Minister Khandu Wangchuk.

A press statement issued by the Bhutanese Community in The Netherlands said more than 50 Bhutanese living there organized the protest in front of the Dutch foreign ministry at the Hague.

According to the statement, the programme was organized to press Bhutan to take back its citizen living as refugee in several camps in eastern Nepal since 1991 and also to pressurise Bhutan’s donors like Netherlands to put condition of refugee repatriation before any future aid to Bhutan.

The protestors carried out banners with the slogans, “Resolve Bhutanese refugee crisis immediately”, “We are Bhutanese and we want to go back to Bhutan”, “Stop racial discrimination in Bhutan” and others.

A memorandum was also submitted to the Head of South Asia at the Dutch Foreign Ministry, Mrs Caro Krijger demanding their urgent attention to the Bhutanese refugee crisis and to resolve it immediately.

Bhutanese Foreign Minister is in Netherlands to lobby for the forthcoming Roundtable Meeting of the Bhutan’s development partners to be held at Geneva from 15-16 Feb 2006.

A similar protest program has been planned for the Roundtable Meeting of the Bhutan’s donors to be held at Geneva from 15-16 Feb 2006.

Over 100,000 Bhutanese refugees of Nepali origin are languishing in the seven UNHCR-maintained camps in eastern Nepal for the last 15 years. There have been over a dozen rounds of bilateral talks between Nepal and Bhutan in as many years, but to no avail.