Miscellaneous
Govt nominates envoys for India, US
The government has finally nominated ambassadorial candidates for India and the US on Friday.Ekantipur Report
A Cabinet meeting on Friday recommended Arjun Karki for appointment to the post of Nepali ambassador to India and Deep Kumar Upadhyay for USA.
Karki, who is close to CPN-UML, is a former president of a non-government organisation called ‘Rural Reconstruction Nepal’ while Upadhyay is a Nepali Congress aligned political activist. He lost to UML’s Balaram Adhikari in the second Constitution Assembly election from Kapilvastu-1 under the first-past-the-post electoral system.
The nominees will be sent to the respective countries for agreemo after the parliamentary hearing approves them.
In 2011, then Nepal's Ambassador to India Rukma Shumsher Rana was recalled by the government following a controversy about his dual responsibility as ambassador to India and Managing Director of Dabur Nepal. Since then, no ambassador has been appointed to India although the country witnessed three prime ministers during the period.
During the tenure of UCPN (Maoist) Prime Minister Baburam Bhattarai, Ram Karki of UCPN (M) was recommended for the ambassadorial post to India. However, the appointment could not be made as India did not send the agreemo for him.
Likewise, the ambassadorial position in Washington DC, the capital of United States, has been lying vacant after Shankar Sharma completed his term in 2014.