CCPR/C/119/D/2184/2012
1.
The author of the communication is Ram Maya Nakarmi, who submits the
communication on her own behalf and on that of her husband, Padam Narayan Nakarmi,
and her minor daughter, L.N. They are all Nepalese nationals, born on 11 January 1977, 17
April 1976 and 22 October 1999, respectively. The author claims that the State party has
violated her husband’s rights under articles 6, 7, 9, 10 and 16, separately and in conjunction
with article 2 (3), of the Covenant; her rights under article 7, alone and in conjunction with
article 2 (3); and her minor daughter’s rights under article 7, read in conjunction with 2 (3)
and 24 (1) of the Covenant. The author is represented by counsel. The Covenant and its
Optional Protocol entered into force for the State party on 14 August 1991.
The facts as submitted by the author
2.1
From 1996 to 2006, an internal armed conflict took place in Nepal between the
Government and the Communist Party of Nepal – Maoist. Broad powers were given to the
law enforcement officers by the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities Ordinance. For long
periods, the State party declared a state of emergency and several rights were suspended.
Both parties to the conflict, including the police and the Royal Nepalese Army, committed
atrocities, and enforced disappearances became a widespread phenomenon. 1 During that
period, and especially after 2003, the Bhairab Nath Barracks of the Royal Nepalese Army
in Maharajgunj, Kathmandu (also known as the Maharajgunj barracks) became notorious as
a place in which persons suspected of being Maoists were detained, ill-treated, tortured,
disappeared and killed.2
2.2
Mr. Nakarmi used to live in Bungmati, Lalitpur, Nepal, where he worked as an
ironmonger in a small business making iron grills. His was the only source of income for
his family. The author claims that, on 23 September 2003, Mr. Nakarmi was arrested and
taken from his home by approximately six plain-clothed security personnel who identified
themselves by way of their official identity cards as members of the Royal Nepalese Army
deployed from the Bhairab Nath Barracks. Several people, including the author and Mr.
Nakarmi’s mother and brother, witnessed his arrest.
2.3
Following her husband’s arrest, the author visited the Bhairab Nath Barracks and the
Lagankhel Barracks, in Lalitpur, on a regular basis for two years. Personnel of both
barracks always denied that Mr. Nakarmi was held there. She also regularly visited the
Nepal Police Headquarters in Naxal, Kathmandu, and the District Police Office in
Hanuman Dhoka, Kathmandu, but they always informed her that her husband was not in
police custody. However, shortly after her husband’s arrest, a former detainee of the
Bhairab Nath Barracks told the author that her husband was in the barracks.
2.4
In October 2003, the author tried to register a first information report with the
District Police Office in Patan. The author submits that the police refused to register the
report on the grounds that it could only be submitted for crimes listed in schedule 1 of the
State Cases Act of 1992 and that enforced disappearance was not on the list.
2.5
The author claims that, at some point between 2005 and 2006, two other former
detainees of the Bhairab Nath Barracks, K.K.C. and H.S., who were released in 2005, told
her that they had seen her husband in the Barracks.
2.6
In May 2006, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in Nepal
(OHCHR-Nepal) issued a report on investigation into arbitrary detention, torture and
disappearances at the Bhairab Nath Barracks in 2003-2004. 3 The name of the author’s
husband was mentioned among those of detainees whose whereabouts were still not
clarified and who were reported to have been very ill when last seen by former co-detainees
in 2004 and in early 2005. According to that report, detainees’ testimonies indicated that,
by late December 2003, Mr. Nakarmi was suffering from severe swelling of the body and
1
2
3
2
See reports of the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances, E/CN.4/2004/58, para.
227, and A/HRC/13/31, annex IV (graph relating to Nepal), and Office of the United Nations High
Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), “Conflict-related disappearances in Bardiya District”
(December 2008), pp. 5 and 27 (available from http://nepal.ohchr.org).
The author refers to OHCHR, “Report of investigation into arbitrary detention, torture and
disappearance at the Maharajgunj RNA barracks, Kathmandu, in 2003 and 2004” (May 2006).
Ibid.