KATHMANDU: Nepal is prepared to solve its problems with India through talks between the two neighboring nations, King Birendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev said on April 13.
“It is indeed unfortunate that at a time when all our energies were being directed to fulfill the minimum basic needs of our people, we have been exposed to hardship imposed on us by our geography as a landlocked nation,” the King said in a message to the nation on Nepal’s new year day.
He said the government is ever ready to settle this problem through friendly dialogue and negotiation.”
He said in the course of its national development Nepal had to face numerous difficulties and impediments.
Overcoming these one after another, he said, Nepal had succeeded to some extent in moving forward in all fields social, political and economic but while the country had made some advances there was no doubt that much more remain to be done, he said.
In an obvious reference to the present statement in trade and transit the King said, “it is indeed unfortunate that at a time when all our energies were being directed to fulfill the minimum basic needs of our people we have been exposed to hardships imposed on us by our geography as a landlocked nation.”
“As is known to all my Government is ever ready to settle this problem through friendly dialogue and negotiation, he said.
In trying times like these, the Nepal monarch said, “while on the one hand we should take recourse to the path of self-reliance with patience self-restraint and dignity we should on the other hand, be able to demonstrate our ability to weather the storm through national solidarity.
“We call upon all therefore, to unite rather than to divide to adopt a reasoned approach rather than be swayed by emotion, to behave with courtesy rather than act in a manner unbecoming of us. We also call upon all to impress upon our friends and well-wishers everywhere that Nepal which aspirers to become a zone of peace bears ill will towards none,” King Birendra said.
Meanwhile the statement created by the expiring of the IndoNepal treaty on trade and transit on March 23 seems to be on way to being broken with the possibility of a meeting at the level of the Commerce Ministers of both the countries soon.
The Nepalese Foreign Minister Mr. Shailendra Kumar Upadhyaya said here that following indications received by him to this effect he had requested his colleague in the Commerce Ministry here to get in touch with his Indian counterpart in New Delhi.
Article extracted from this publication >> April 28, 1989
