Blackwell Reference Online

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On June 1, 2001, King Birendra of Nepal, his wife, and several members of the royal family were shot and killed by his son, Crown Prince Dipendra, who then committed suicide by shooting himself. Prince Gyanendra, the younger brother of King Birendra, was crowned king. King Gyanendra dismissed the government in October 2002, labeling it corrupt and useless. He declared a state of emergency in November and ordered the army to crack down on the Maoist guerillas. On February 1, 2005, the royal coup was further advanced when the king appointed a government led by himself and simultaneously enforced martial law to deal with the insurgency. Several top political leaders were apprehended and other opposition leaders fled to India and regrouped there. A broad alliance, the Seven Party Alliance (SPA), was formed, including about 90 percent of the parliamentarians from the dissolved parliament, who came from the Nepali Congress Party (NCP), the Communist Party of Nepal (United Marxist Leninist) (CPN-UML), and others. In December 2005, the SPA signed a 12-point understanding with the Maoists by which the Maoists committed themselves to multiparty democracy and freedom of speech, while the SPA accepted Maoist demands for elections to a Constituent Assembly. In early 2006, the situation became even more volatile as the SPA launched a series of agitations, followed by waves of arrests of opposition ... log in or subscribe to read full text