Nepal is set to take on Iraq in its second group stage match of the AFC U-16 Qualifiers 2013 at Dasharath Stadium on Friday.
In their earlier matches, Nepal had defeated Bahrain 2-0 while Iraq beat Turkmenistan 8-1 in the inaugural match of the tournament on Wednesday.
So far, Iraq is at the top of the chart and host Nepal is at the second spot with three points each.
Similarly, Bahrain and Turkmenistan will face each other in another match of the day.
Nepal has been drawn alongside Iraq, Bahrain and Turkmenistan in Group C. Nepal will take on Turkmenistan in its last group stage match on Sunday.
All together 43 teams have entered the fray for this edition of the tournament and have been divided into 10 groups of five and four teams.
The 10 group winners and best five runner-up from all groups will qualify for the tournament in Thailand. nepalnews.com
Armed Police Force (APF) is all set to organise First National Open Women´s Volleyball Tournament on the occasion of its 13th anniversary from October 2 to 6 in the capital.
Altogether eight teams including one team each from the five development regions and host APF, Police and New Diamond Club will vie for the title in the event, according to APF. “The tournament will be played on league-cum-knockout format.”
The top three winners will bag Rs 250,000, Rs 125,000 and Rs 50,000 respectively, said APF AIG Durja Kumar Rai during a press meet at its headquarters Halchowk, Kathmandu. “This is the highest cash prize ever in women´s volleyball.”
The inaugural match will be held at the APF court in Halchowk while remaining matches will be played at the Dasharath Stadium covered hall in Tripureshwar. Nepalnews.com
The Supreme Court (SC) has ordered the government and the Election Commission (EC) to not allow convicted persons from contesting Constituent Assembly elections.
A special bench of Justice Susheela Karki, Girish Chandra Lal, and Prakash Wosti issued an order to this effect on Thursday in response to a writ petition filed at the SC against the Prime Minister´s Office and the EC demanding that the murder convicts as well as those against whom charges of heinous crimes have been framed by a court of law be debarred from contesting the CA polls.
The SC also scrapped the September 23 stay order by SC Justice Tarka Raj Bhatta that effectively allowed murder convicts to contest elections.
The latest SC verdict has now barred all murder convicts, including UCPN (Maoist) leader Bal Krishna Dhungel, to file candidacy for the November 19 election to the second Constituent Assembly. Nepalnews.com
Chairperson of Interim Election Council (IEC) Khil Raj Regmi left Kathmandu for New York of USA to attend the 68th session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) on Thursday. The IEC chair is leading the Nepali delegation to UN assembly.
Accompanied by his wife Shanta Regmi and personal aide, Regmi left for New York at around 9:00 pm on Thursday night.
Regmi is scheduled to address the UNGA on September 28 and attend other high-level parleys including possible separate meetings with UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh during his six-day New York visit.
Members of the Nepali delegation – Foreign Secretary Arjun Bahadur Thapa, Chief of UN Division at the Ministry Deepak Dhital and Joint-Secretary at the Divisio, Bishnu Gautam are already in New York, according to the Foreign Ministry. Permanent Representative of Nepal to the United Nations and other officials of the Permanent Mission will join the delegation in New York.
Regmi will return home on October 1. Nepalnews.com
Region No. 3 Kathmandu, Region No. 2 Birgunj, Region No. 5 Nepalgunj and Armed Police Force won their respective matches in the first day of the Pepsi Standard Chartered Senior T20 National Tournament that kicked off in Kathmandu on Thursday.
Kathmandu defeated Region No. 4 Bhairahawa by 84 runs from Group A while Birgunj beat Region No. 1 Biratnagar by nine wickets, Nepalgunj defeated Region No. 7 Janakpur by 25 runs and APF thrashed Region No. 8 Pokhara by 92 runs from Group B.
In the first inning held at TU Ground today, Kathmandu posted a target of 163 runs with the loss of five wickets as Bivatsy Thapa scored 44 runs, Arjun Adhikari 33 runs and Suraj KC 26 runs. Fazlur Rehman Khan of Bhairahawa grabbed two wickets.
While chasing the target, Bhairahawa were restricted just to 78 runs in 14.1 overs. Anil Karki grabbed four wickets while Niraj Basnet took three and Prakash Bista two for Kathmandu. Basnet was declared man of the match as he also scored 17 runs for the winning team.
In another match held at the same ground, Birgunj beat Region No. 1 Biratnagar by nine wickets as the winning team easily met the target of 85 runs in 14.1 overs.
Amit Shrestha scored 43 runs while Hasim Ansari 19 runs and Suraj Patel 18 runs. Man of the match alone took three wickets for Birgunj against Biratnagar.
Meanwhile, in the match played at Pulchowk Engineering Ground today itself, Nepalgunj won against Janakpur by 25 runs as Nepalgunj’s powerful bowling held Janakpur just to 117 runs against the target of 142 runs. Aakash Bista and Nijamuddin Halwahi took three wickets each for Nepalgunj.
Similarly, in another match held at Pulchowk Engineering, departmental team APF posted a target of 194 runs losing four wickets against Pokhara. In reply, Pokhara was restricted just to 101 losing six wickets as Bhuwan Karki and Rom Shrestha named two wickets each in their folds from the winning team.
APF’s Gyanendra Malla scored highest of 90 runs while Paras Khadka contributed 35 runs, Subash Khakurel 27 runs and Dipendra Chaudhary 24 runs. nepalnews.com / Rajin Rai
Some 1,000 leaders and cadres of UCPN (Maoist) and CPN-Maoist Thursday joined the CPN-UML amid a function held at the UML’s headquarters at Balkhu, Kathmandu.
“All new entrants are from Bajura, a hilly district in the far-west region,” Karna Bahadur Thapa, central committee member of UML told Nepalnews.
“With such an en masse entry into UML, our party has secured one seat from Bajura for the upcoming elections of the second Constituent Assembly,” said Thapa, who stood second in the first Constituent Assembly elections in 2008 but lost with narrow margin to a Nepali Congress candidate.
The UCPN (Maoist)’s Bajura district secretariat member, Jaya Bir Buda and 350 others joined the UML.
Similarly, the CPN-Maoist’s district level leader, Min Bahadur Bista and 50 others entered the UML. Bista was the candidate of the then CPN-Maoist for the first Constituent Assembly election in 2008. He stood third in the election with 13,000 votes.
Dambar Sunar, the former company vice-commander of then Maoist combatants also joined UML along with 150 cadres. UML Chairman Jhalanath Khanal and other top leaders welcomed the new entrants, who were around 1,000 in total, according to Thapa. Nepalnews.com / Kishor Poudel
Foreign Secretary Arjun Bahadur Thapa
A Council of Ministers’ meeting Thursday proposed Arjun Bahadur Thapa, the Secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, to the post of SAARC Secretary General.
On a rotation basis, this is Nepal’s term to nominate the SAARC Secretary General, as the current Secretary General, Ahmed Saleem of Maldives is retiring soon.
Thapa will be the second SAARC Secretary General on Nepal’s quota. Nepal’s first SAARC Secretary General was Yadav Kant Silwal (January 1994-December 1995).
Thapa will be the 11th SAARC Secretary General, since the South Asian Association of Regional Cooperation was established in December 1985. Nepalnews.com
France has shown interest to intall a cable car in the Kathmandu valley in order to ease increasing traffic in the main city.
During the meeting with Finance Minister Shankar Prasa Koirala in the capital on Thursday, Acting French Ambassador to Nepal Virgin Cortewall said that the development of cable car would be a better option in controlling traffic jams and pollution in the capital.
The French government is ready to conduct the feasibility study in the valley, said Cortewall. “Similar projects have also been successful in other countries under French assistance.”
On the occasion, FM Koirala said that such project would play a significant role in reducing the government’s expenses on the imports of petroleum products.
Installment of cable car is also favourable in view of tourism development and environment, said Koirala. “However, the service should be affordable to all.”
Koirala also stressed on the need of development of electronic technologies to minimise the consumption of fuel. nepalnews.com
Nepal’s five development partners – Norway, Switzerland, UNICEF, UNFPA and UN Women on Thursday signed a joint MoU of development cooperation with Nepal for a period of five years (2013-2017).
Nepal’s Secretary of Finance, Shanta Raj Subedi and Alf Arne Ramslien, Ambassador of Norway to Nepal signed the document to this effect on behalf of their respective government and coalition amid a function in the capital.
This arrangement will provide financial assistance to the government of Nepal for the successful implementation of the second phase of Local Governance and Community Development Program (LGCDP-II).
According to a press statement issued by the Ministry of Finance, the total estimated cost of the Program is US$ 1,362 million (Rs 136.2 billion).
Of the total cost, the government will contribute US$ 1,126 million (Rs 112.6 billion) and the development partners US$ 236 million (Rs 23.6 billion).
The program will be executed by the Ministry of Federal Affairs and Local Development and implemented through local bodies. It covers all 75 districts, 58 municipalities and 3,915 VDCs, and will run from July 16, 2013 to July 17, 2017.
LGCDP II is expected to benefit two million households by providing them community infrastructure based on bottom-up planning process. It will strengthen local governance and ensure that 90 percent of VDC secretaries are in a position to deliver services effectively.
The first phase of the LGCDP completed in July 2013, successfully establishing important links between the state and citizens in the aftermath of the conflict.
LGCDP-I reached to almost one million people, at least 50 per cent of them women, through 40,000 ward citizen forums to hold the local bodies accountable.
However, the program also fell under sharp criticism for its very poor monitoring mechanism and thus failing to check several incidents of corruption and malpractices by the local implementing NGOs and other bodies. Presence of LGCDP officials was rare during execution of a program, for example, public hearing, while visual documentation in part of the implementing agencies was not mandatory, thus creating big loop holes for irregularities.
The program is said to have upgraded over 8,700 kilometers of roads, renovated 2,150 schools and upgraded 1,031 health facilities and benefitted 1.9 million households by providing community infrastructure on demand.
Considering the importance of the program, the government has decided to implement the 2nd phase of LGCDP under the joint funding approach, according to the statement. nepalnews.com
Thirty victims of trafficking, including 23 children and 7 women, have been rescued from Nepal’s border with India in Banke and Kailali districts, said news reports on Thursday.
From Trinagar customs point of Dhangadhi in Kailali, police have rescued 23 orphan children, apparently being taken to a hostel in Lakhimpur of Uttar Pradesh in India.
Among the children, 19 were from remote Kalikot district, while 4 were from Doti district. All of them are in the age group of 5 to 15.
“We have handed over the children to Maiti Nepal and District Child Welfare Committee. We have arrested four individuals in this connection and are investigating the matter,” said Rishi Kadel, an officer with District Police Office, Kailali.
Likewise, police have rescued 7 women from Kohalpur of Banke, when they were being rushed to India to be flown to Gulf countries later.
The rescue became possible after the police received clue that the women were kept in a hotel in Kohalpur. Police raided the hotel and handed them over to Maiti Nepal.
The seven rescued women have been identified as Takmaya Tamang and Phurpi Tamang (Sindhupalchowk), Jamuna Gurung and Usha Gurung (Chitwan), Manju Pariyar (Dhading), Lila Kumari Sharma (Jhapa) and Hira Pariyar (Kaski). Nepalnews.com