(RESTRICTED FOR PRIVATE CIRCULATION ONLY)
January-March 2004
Bhutanese leaders calls for
constitutional monarchy.
NEW DELHI, Jan 26 - At a time when major
political parties in Nepal are fighting for transition from absolute to constitutional
monarchy, a prominent Bhutanese leader freed from confinement in New Delhi called on all
Bhutanese individuals and organisations to fight for the same in Bhutan.
"We want constitutional monarchy
under which the king will have no absolute power," Rongthong Kuenley Dorji, founding
chairperson of the Druk National Congress (DNC) told The Kathmandu Post on Sunday after
being freed from confinement this weekend, on the orders of the Delhi High Court. Although
released on bail by the Court in June 1998 after 14 months in Tihar Jail in the Indian
capital, he was not allowed to go outside the
city limits since then. He has been set free for 10days.
He was arrested in April 1997 after the
Indian authorities received an extradition request from the Bhutanese authorities. He was
arrested on charges of travelling without a passport. Human rights organisations,
including the Amnesty International, believe that the basis for his extradition request
was politically motivated.
According to the Indo-Bhutan treaty of 1949, a Bhutanese citizen can travel to India
without a passport. But the same was denied to Dorji on the ground that he was travelling
to India to meet Indian political leaders to garner support for democratic movement inside
Bhutan.
Dorji is visiting Bodh Gaya in Bihar, which is one of the holiest of Buddhist pilgrimages
tomorrow to attend a religious gathering in which thousands of Bhutan’s Buddhists are
scheduled to take part."Seven years have passed since my arrest and I still have to
present myself in the court twice a week every Monday and Thursday," said Dorji.
Dorji said he has urged Bhutan’s prominent human rights leader Tek Nath Rizal to lead
the Bhutanese refugees and join politics. He also called upon all Bhutanese living in
exile and organisations to become united and fight for their rights against the
"autocratic Bhutanese regime," adding disunity among them has delayed the
solution to the Bhutanese refugee crisis.On third party mediation to resolve the Bhutanese
refugee crisis, Dorji called for India’s or United Nations’ intervention to help
resolve the refugee impasse."If the refugee leaders unite under the leadership of
Rizal and lobby in India to intervene, the problems would be resolved with in few
years."
The exiled leader said that the refugees should not return to Bhutan without the guarantee
of democracy, human rights and political change.
"No Bhutanese refugee should return under the conditions laid down by Bhutan. After
all, refugees have wasted so many years in the struggle for democracy. What is the use
when they return just like that?"
He also ridiculed the Bhutanese government’s
military action against Indian ultras – ULFA, KLO and Bodo militants – saying
"those militants were invited to Bhutan by the then Home Minister Dago Tshering to
help counter the democratic movement in SouthernBhutan".
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