English - Support to Participatory Constitution Building in Nepal ...

Chapter12Proliferation of small armsand challenges to post-conflictstate building1. Setting the contextBishnu Raj Upreti 1Nepal is in complex, fuzzy, lengthy and contested state building process.The political transition is becoming more contested after the collapse ofthe UCPN (Maoist) [hereinafter referred as UCPN (Maoist)]-led coalitiongovernment. The major reason behind this was the deep mistrust amongthe parliamentary political parties and UCPN (Maoist) that spilled overafter the cabinet decision to terminate the stay of the Chief of the ArmyStaff (CoAS). Further, complications like intra-party disputes, powerstruggles in main coalition parties and delay in the formation of thecabinet arose while forming the new government. Non-cooperation fromthe major political players, extreme external interests and frustration onNepalese people on the extremely poor performance of political partiesin managing transition have posed severe challenges to peace process sofar.The big achievements in the peace process made during the past three andhalf years have to be institutionalised by promulgating new and publiclyowned constitution, integration and rehabilitation of ex-combatants ofUCPN (Maoist) and restructuring of the security sector, delivery of peacedividends, restructuring of the state, initiating economic recovery anddevelopment, providing transitional justice, ensuring transitional securityand control of proliferation of small arms in the country. However, exceptsome achievements in constitution making process, all other importantpillars of peace process have not been taken care of properly by the majorpolitical parties and the government. Amidst all these, the proliferation ofSALW has appeared as a hallmark challenge in the post-conflict security ofNepal. This chapter discusses on the same issue in more details.The Panel of Governmental Experts (UN 1997) defines small arms asrevolvers and self-loading pistols; rifles and carbines; sub-machine-guns;1South Asia Regional Coordinator, Swiss National Centre of Competence in Research (NCCR North-South); bupreti@nccr.wlink.com.np241