Nepal bus bomb rebels implicate the govt

Communist rebels today said that Nepal’s royal government may have had a hand in a landmine explosion that killed 38 people and wounded 71 others on a bus, and vowed to conduct their own investigation into the attack.

The army has blamed the rebels for the explosion yesterday. The guerrillas did not deny responsibility for the attack in a brief statement on their Nepali-language website, but said they would launch a “serious” investigation.

“We also have suspicion that this could be a conspiracy to disrupt the integrated movement against the royal government,” the rebel statement said without elaborating.

The explosion in Nepal’s rural south hurled the bus into the air and tore it apart – one of the bloodiest attacks on Nepalese civilians since the Maoist insurgency began nearly a decade ago.

Army investigators said the attack was the work of the rebels, who have been fighting since 1996 to abolish Nepal’s constitutional monarchy and set up a communist state.

Although the guerrillas have repeatedly said in the past they do not target civilians, they have attacked civilian passenger buses that defied their calls for transportation strikes.

A Royal Nepalese Army bomb disposal official, Major Navin Silwal, said he suspected the explosive device was triggered by a rebel hiding behind a tree near where the landmine was planted.

The attack came without warning in a rural area of southern Nepal many believed to be relatively safe from insurgent attacks, and it was unclear why the bus was targeted. One official said everyone on the bus was either killed or injured.

The bus was crossing a wooden bridge near the village of Badarmude when the explosion threw the vehicle into the air, army officials, who are forbidden to reveal their names for security reasons, said. The bus landed beside the highway on the banks of the Mude river.

People in the area were angered by the attack and were planning to take revenge, said another army official. Grieving villagers gathered at the main market in the area to mourn.

The guerrillas have stepped up violence since February 1, when King Gyanendra took control of the government and imposed a state of emergency that was lifted in April. He said the power grab was necessary to quell the communist insurgency, which has killed more than 11,500 people since 1996.