Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala (File photo)

Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala (File photo)
Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala is set to start negotiations with the Maoists very soon in order to forge consensus on the issue of management of arms.

Minister of State for Labour and Transport Management, Ramesh Lekhak, who is also a member of the government’s talks team, told the state-run Radio Nepal on Friday that the Prime Minister told the talks team members that he would soon start negotiations with the Maoists on the arms management issue.

The government’s talks team had met with the Prime Minister on Friday at the latter’s residence to brief him about the ongoing talks process with the Maoist negotiating team.

Maoist Chairman Prachanda
(Photo source : hindu.com)
The PM’s remarks came a day after the Seven Party Alliance (SPA) government and the Maoists failed to submit a common concept to the Assessment Mission of the United Nations led by Staffan de Mistura regarding the modality of the world body’s role in the management of arms.

“An agreement with the Maoists will be reached and a common letter of consent will be sent to the UN very soon”, Lekhak said.

The SPA government and the Maoists have not been able to arrive at a common ground regarding the management of arms. While the government side has been saying that the Maoists’ induction into the government would be done only after the decommissioning of the arms of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), the rebel side has squarely ruled out such a possibility.

To discuss the issue of arms movement, Maoist supremo Prachanda had met with PM Koirala on Thursday, the day when the three-day ‘deadline’ given by the visiting UN team to forge a consensus ended.

Though the two leaders are believed to have agreed to send a joint letter to the UN Secretary-General urging for help in Nepal’s peace process, no official statement has come regarding the format of the joint letter.