Nepal's parliament in a unanimous vote has stripped King Gyanendra of his right to veto laws in a move that formally makes him a ceremonial monarch, an official notice said yesterday.
The law, passed by an interim government that came to power in April when King Gyanendra bowed to popular protests and ceded absolute power, was passed late on Saturday, according to a parliament notice published yesterday.
"Now the king's role is totally ceremonial," Raghuji Panta, a member of parliament from Nepal's second largest party, the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist-Leninist) told reporters.
Parliament made a proclamation last month that drastically clipped the king's authority and Saturday's regulation formally scrapped his right to reject bills and laws passed by parliament, according to a senior legislative member.
"With the approval of the regulation, a new rule has been made that full executive power of the state is centred on the council of ministers and the house holds legislative power," Subash Nemwang, the speaker in the lower house of representatives told reporters.
In addition to losing legislative veto power, the king no longer has control of the 90,000-strong Nepal Army nor can he choose an heir to the throne.
The king was forced from power after protests organized by political parties in concert with Maoist rebels who opposed his seizure of power on February 1 last year.
The parties and rebels have since observed a ceasefire and the government has met a key rebel demand, for elections to an assembly that will redraft Nepal's constitution.
But the rebels want the government to move faster, including dissolving parliament and forming a new interim government that includes them.
"At a time when we have been stressing the dissolution of the present house, all its regulations and announcements are meaningless," Maoist spokesman Krishna Bahadur Mahara told reporters.
"Though some of the points of the regulation are positive, it shows that the parties through their hasty decisions are running away from the major agenda of establishing peace in the country," he said.
A political analyst said the regulation now needed to be followed in a new constitution.
The 1990 constitution ended the absolute monarchy and ushered in parliamentary democracy but gave the king the power to veto laws. The monarch had also retained supreme command of the army.
"Parliamentarians must understand that the regulation is not a substitute for the constitution. An interim constitution is needed to settle the political crisis," said Kapil Shrestha, a politics professor from Nepal's Tribhuvan University.
King Gyanendra sacked the government and took direct control because he said that the political parties were corrupt and had failed to tackle the rebel insurgency.
The move originally drew some popular support as the country, one of the 10 poorest in the world, faced constant strikes and transport blockades that drove up prices and discouraged tourism, a mainstay of the economy.
But the king used his powers to quash dissent including arrests of political leaders and curb the media which sparked an alliance between the rebels and an alliance of seven major parties.
Since the rebels began their "people's war" in 1996, at least 12,500 people have been killed.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
A top Vietnamese property tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to death in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with an estimated US$27 billion in damages. A panel of three hand-picked jurors and two judges rejected all defense arguments by Truong My Lan, chair of major developer Van Thinh Phat, who was found guilty of swindling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade. “The defendant’s actions ... eroded people’s trust in the leadership of the [Communist] Party and state,” read the verdict at the trial in Ho Chi Minh City. After the five-week trial, 85 others were also sentenced on
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of