Nepal is recovering from a decade-long civil war that ended in 2006 and struggles with a fragile economy, crippling power cuts, ethnic divisions and a deteriorating security situation.

Regional giants China and India, which compete to win Nepal as a geo-political ally, will be watching the vote with keen interest, as protracted instability in the young republic could become a fresh security headache for them.

“We have scheduled the election for November 19,” Law Minister Hari Prasad Neupane told Reuters after a cabinet meeting.

The vote is expected to boost a fragile peace process that ended a conflict that caused more than 16,000 deaths.

Polls will produce a 491-member Constituent Assembly that will draft a new constitution for Nepal which ended centuries of a Hindu monarchical system under which the kings, then considered by many as gods, wielded near-absolute powers.

The assembly will also double as parliament.

The term of the previous parliament expired in May last year without completing a draft constitution, with disagreement between the main political parties over the future set up of the government and the creation of new federal provinces.

Elections, which had been set for November last year, were delayed due to political discord resulting in five government changes since 2008 when the last elections took place.

Donors including the United States are hopeful that the polls will create the stability needed to attract investment and boost economic growth seen at 3.5 percent this fiscal year to mid-July, the lowest in five years.

Some analysts say the vote could be delayed yet again as some small political parties have said they would boycott it.

In addition, a group of those parties, including some breakaway hardline Maoists, have threatened to disrupt the vote if it is held without their consent.

They are opposed to the caretaker government headed by the Supreme Court chief justice and want a government led by a politician to oversee the vote.

(Editing by Robin Pomeroy)

Yuichiro Miura, who took the standard southeast ridge route pioneered by Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay 60 years ago, reached the top of the 8,848 meter (29,028 feet) mountain at roughly 9:00 a.m. local time (11pm EDT). He was accompanied by three other Japanese, including his son, and six Nepali sherpas.

“It feels great,” he told family members and supporters gathered in Tokyo by satellite phone from the summit.

Miura, who first climbed Everest in 2003 and repeated the feat five years later, takes the oldest climber record from Nepal’s Min Bahadur Sherchan, who reached the summit at the age of 76 in 2008.

“The record is not so important to me,” Miura told Reuters in April, before setting off for Everest. “It is important to get to the top.”

Miura spent the night at 8,500 meters (27,887 ft) at the Balcony in the so-called “death zone” before launching his final ascent, rather than the 8,000 meter South Col which is used as a resting place by most climbers before the summit climb, said Gyanendra Shrestha, a Nepal Tourism Ministry official.

His ascent had been watched closely in Japan, with daily broadcasts of phone calls and photographs from the climb – including one night when he and his fellow climbers drank green Japanese tea and ate hand-rolled sushi in their tent high on the mountain’s side.

A noted adventurer, Miura skied down Everest from the South Col in 1970, a feat that became the subject of a documentary. He has since skied down the highest mountains on each of the seven continents, following the tradition of his late father Keizo, who skied down Europe’s Mont Blanc at the age of 99.

He trained for the Everest climb by hiking in Tokyo with weighted packs and working out on a treadmill in a special low-oxygen room in his home.

Nearly 4,000 climbers have reached the Everest summit since the pioneering May 1953 climb, while 240 have lost their lives on its slopes.

Miura is not the first record-setter on Everest this climbing season.

Raha Moharrak became the first Saudi Arabian woman to conquer the peak, while Sudarshan Gautam, a 30-year-old Nepali-born Canadian who lost both arms in an accident, became the first double amputee to summit.

Miura’s record may only be his to savor briefly. Nepal’s Min Bahadur Sherchan, now 81, plans to start climbing the peak this coming weekend.

(Reporting by Gopal Sharma and Elaine Lies, editing by Elaine Lies and Michael Perry)

Three experienced climbers from Britain, Italy and Switzerland were on route to camp three at 7,000 meters (22,965 feet) on the 8,850 meters (29,035 feet) Everest summit when a brawl broke out on Saturday with sherpas fixing their ropes.

Witnesses said the sherpas pelted the Europeans’ tents with stones and punches were thrown.

Swiss climber Ueli Steck descended to the base camp after the attack and said he would abandon the climb and return to Kathmandu if proper security was not ensured.

Nepali officials were quick to respond after the unusual brawl on Mount Everest, which is a key source of income for impoverished Nepal as foreign climbers pay royalties to scale the world’s highest peak.

Tourism Ministry official Dipendra Paudel said the government would ensure the safety and security of the climbers.

“There was a slight misunderstanding and communication gap between them,” Paudel said in Kathmandu after contacting the base camp. “This has been sorted out and the climbers are at the base camp.”

He said the European climbers would resume their bid to climb Everest.

Officials said hundreds of climbers from 32 expeditions and their sherpas were on Mount Everest in the current climbing season which continues through May.

Sherpas are locals from the Everest region and are noted for their climbing skills. They are responsible for fixing ropes and accompany most of the foreign climbers to the summit.

Beni Hyoju, an official of the Cho-Oyu Trekking agency that organized the expedition, said the three European climbers had failed to comply with a request from their sherpa guides to stay at a location while the guides fixed the route.

Hyoju said this made the sherpas unhappy and they attacked the climbers. No one was critically wounded.

“(Steck) has now agreed to continue the climb after local administration assured proper security,” Hyoju said. “Sherpas who were responsible for the fight will offer (an) apology.”

Historian Elizabeth Hawley, who has been tracking foreign expeditions to Mount Everest for more than five decades, said this type of fighting on the mountain was rare.

“I have not heard of any such incident before,” said Hawley.

About 4,000 climbers have reached the top of Everest since it was first scaled by New Zealander Sir Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay in 1953.

(Reporting by Gopal Sharma, Editing by Belinda Goldsmith)

The volatile Himalayan nation is still recovering from a brutal civil conflict which ended in 2006 and in which more than 16,000 were killed, hundreds disappeared and thousands injured.

Sabina Lauber, in charge of Nepal at the U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, said giving amnesty to anyone guilty of serious crimes ran counter to Nepal’s obligations to humanitarian law and would deny victims their right to justice.

“The state of Nepal has an obligation to investigate the truth and prosecute those responsible for grave human rights violations,” Lauber, on a visit to Nepal, told Reuters.

“Amnesty prevents genuine peace and risks new conflict,” she said after a meeting with conflict victims and human rights workers in Kathmandu. “Victims don’t forget these crimes.”

Nepal’s main political parties, including Maoist former rebels, finalized an order last month to set up the Truth and Reconciliation Commission as part of a Comprehensive Peace Accord aimed at healing wounds left by the war.

As part of a deal, they included a clause allowing the panel to grant amnesty in some cases. Victim groups fear the vague wording is designed to let powerful rights abusers off the hook, possibly even those guilty of serious abuses.

Both the security forces and the Maoists have been accused of human rights violations including unlawful killings, torture and rape during the conflict.

The army has promoted suspects while Maoists accused of serious crimes occupy senior positions in the party.

In response to a petition from victims, the Supreme Court has ordered the government not to set up the commission before explaining to the court the decision to include the possibility of amnesty. The next hearing is set for May 2.

In January, an army colonel vacationing in Britain was arrested on suspicion of torture allegedly committed during Nepal’s civil war – the most senior Nepalese army officer held for crimes dating back to the conflict.

In Nepal, the Supreme Court and district courts have issued arrest warrants against those found guilty of rights abuses in the past, but they have not been implemented. No one so far has been arrested or tried in a civilian court for serious abuses.

(Reporting by Gopal Sharma; editing by Mike Collett-White)

The June to September monsoon is vital for 55 percent of India’s farmland, which has no irrigation facilities. For one of the world’s largest agricultural producers, the rains can make the difference between being an exporter or importer of staples such as rice and sugar.

“This year’s monsoon, as a whole, is most likely to be within the normal range,” said D.S. Pai, lead forecaster of the Indian weather office, releasing the consensus forecast of the South Asian Climate Outlook Forum, a group of weather experts.

Forecasting the monsoon is difficult and India itself only makes two official attempts, one due on April 26 and another in June, when the rains should have covered half the country. It is working with many of the world’s experts to improve accuracy.

The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has found it hard to predict extremes of weather and has twice gone wrong since 2005. Added to that, the monsoon can be patchy and last year, even though overall rains were ample, many areas had drought.

Agriculture accounts for about 15 percent of Asia’s third-largest economy, with more than 800 million Indians living in rural areas. Ample harvests can also help keep a lid on food inflation, which is around a stubborn nine percent.

Forecasting has become a big event and private forecaster Skymet issued a party-style invitation for its predictions on Wednesday, which said rains would be average.

In March, Pai told Reuters that India was set for average rains in 2013.

The rains could be less than average in some parts of Pakistan and Sri Lanka, the forum said, while Nepal and Bhutan could get heavier showers.

“The more likely scenario is for below normal rainfall over some areas of northwestern and southern parts of south Asia, and for above normal rainfall in some areas along Himalayan region,” Pai said, reading from the consensus statement.

Following bumper harvests in recent years, India is exporting wheat to keep the grain from rotting in overflowing bins.

World grain prices touched record highs late last summer after a bruising year that featured a historic U.S. drought, dryness in Eastern Europe and a third spike in global food prices in four years.

The next few months will be crucial as weather conditions in the United States, the world’s top wheat exporter, will determine its harvest.

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GRAPHIC: India farm output vs monsoon rainfall

link.reuters.com/jer47t

Graphic: India monsoon – forecast vs actual

link.reuters.com/ger47t

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The El Nino weather phenomenon was unlikely to influence monsoon rains in the first half of the June-September season, the weather group said.

El Nino, an abnormal warming of waters in the equatorial tropical Pacific, is associated with poor rains or a drought-like situation in southeast Asia and Australia.

“El Nino is going to be neutral and continue to remain so,” said Rupa Kumar Kolli, head of the climate applications and service division of the World Meteorological Organisation.

India’s weather office rates as normal rainfall between 96 and 104 percent of a 50-year average of 89 centimetres during the entire four-month season. The last drought with rains below this range was in 2009 and before that, in 2004.

Last year, a late revival of the monsoon in the second half of the June to September rainy season helped India escape widespread drought, and the season ended with rainfall at 92 percent of the long period average.

But seven states in the country’s south and west, including key sugar producer Maharashtra and cotton-producing Gujarat, had very low rainfall and are still battling acute drought that has hammered farmers’ incomes and made this year’s rains critical. (Additional reporting by Ratnajyoti Dutta in NEW DELHI; Writing by Jo Winterbottom; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

The June to September monsoon is vital for 55 percent of
India’s farmland, which has no irrigation facilities. For one of
the world’s largest agricultural producers, the rains can make
the difference between being an exporter or importer of staples
such as rice and sugar.

“This year’s monsoon, as a whole, is most likely to be
within the normal range,” said D.S. Pai, lead forecaster of the
Indian weather office, releasing the consensus forecast of the
South Asian Climate Outlook Forum, a group of weather experts.

Forecasting the monsoon is difficult and India itself only
makes two official attempts, one due on April 26 and another in
June, when the rains should have covered half the country. It is
working with many of the world’s experts to improve accuracy.

The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has found it hard
to predict extremes of weather and has twice gone wrong since
2005. Added to that, the monsoon can be patchy and last year,
even though overall rains were ample, many areas had drought.

Agriculture accounts for about 15 percent of Asia’s
third-largest economy, with more than 800 million Indians living
in rural areas. Ample harvests can also help keep a lid on food
inflation, which is around a stubborn nine percent.

Forecasting has become a big event and private forecaster
Skymet issued a party-style invitation for its predictions on
Wednesday, which said rains would be average.

In March, Pai told Reuters that India was set for average
rains in 2013.

The rains could be less than average in some parts of
Pakistan and Sri Lanka, the forum said, while Nepal and Bhutan
could get heavier showers.

“The more likely scenario is for below normal rainfall over
some areas of northwestern and southern parts of south Asia, and
for above normal rainfall in some areas along Himalayan region,”
Pai said, reading from the consensus statement.

Following bumper harvests in recent years, India is
exporting wheat to keep the grain from rotting in overflowing
bins.

World grain prices touched record highs late last summer
after a bruising year that featured a historic U.S. drought,
dryness in Eastern Europe and a third spike in global food
prices in four years.

The next few months will be crucial as weather conditions in
the United States, the world’s top wheat exporter, will
determine its harvest.

The El Nino weather phenomenon was unlikely to influence
monsoon rains in the first half of the June-September season,
the weather group said.

El Nino, an abnormal warming of waters in the equatorial
tropical Pacific, is associated with poor rains or a
drought-like situation in southeast Asia and Australia.

“El Nino is going to be neutral and continue to remain so,”
said Rupa Kumar Kolli, head of the climate applications and
service division of the World Meteorological Organisation.

India’s weather office rates as normal rainfall between 96
and 104 percent of a 50-year average of 89 centimetres during
the entire four-month season. The last drought with rains below
this range was in 2009 and before that, in 2004.

Last year, a late revival of the monsoon in the second half
of the June to September rainy season helped India escape
widespread drought, and the season ended with rainfall at 92
percent of the long period average.

But seven states in the country’s south and west, including
key sugar producer Maharashtra and cotton-producing Gujarat, had
very low rainfall and are still battling acute drought that has
hammered farmers’ incomes and made this year’s rains critical.

(Additional reporting by Ratnajyoti Dutta in NEW DELHI; Writing
by Jo Winterbottom; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

Rabi Lamichhane, a former TV journalist from Nepal turned manager of a fast food restaurant in Baltimore, Maryland returned to his homeland to talk on air non-stop for 62 hours and 12 minutes, a feat certified by the Guinness World Records as the longest marathon talk show.

“It was not difficult physically but sometimes I found it hard to concentrate,” Lamichhane told Reuters after emerging from the studios of a local TV station.

The 36-year-old host talked with politicians, artists, diplomats, businessmen, social workers and journalists about contemporary issues mainly in the Nepali language with English sub-titles on his “Lord Buddha was born in Nepal” show to beat the Guinness record of 52 hours set in 2011 by two people from Ukraine.

Guinness World Records allowed a break of five minutes every hour. It was not clear how many people watched the show.

Lamichhane said he did not sleep during the show, ate mainly fruits, drank up to 15 cups of coffee a day and lived on energy drinks.

Lamichhane began the show on Thursday, aiming to clear up what he said was a misunderstanding over the birthplace of Buddha.

(Reporting by Gopal Sharma, editing by Paul Casciato)

Hundreds of refugees from the Chinese province of Tibet cross treacherous mountain passes to reach Nepal each year, but as the influence of China grows in its impoverished neighbour, their passage is becoming increasingly difficult.

In the past, Tibetan exiles captured by Nepali police were handed to the United Nation’s High Commissioner for Refugees for their onward journey to India, where the Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama lives in exile.

But the U.S. statesman said Tibetan exiles were now facing harassment at the border, and called on the government to resist pressure to impede the movement of refugees.

“My hope is that the Nepali government will not accede,” he told reporters.

Sandwiched between emerging giants China and India, Nepal has been courted by both its powerful neighbours as it tries to find its feet after a decade-long civil war that ended in 2006.

Nepal is home to around 20,000 Tibetans who have fled Chinese rule in their remote region. In recent years, the Nepali government has crushed protests by Tibetans against China, the country’s top donor and key trade partner.

A Tibetan exile set himself on fire and died last month while another also tried to self-immolate but was overpowered last year.

The former president, whose Carter Center observed Nepal’s last elections in 2008, arrived last week to encourage political parties to conduct delayed national elections and to push forward a peace process following the war. Carter said his organisation would again observe the polls expected this year.

Last month, political parties appointed the chief justice as the head of a caretaker government to hold elections in June after they failed to agree on a politician for the job [ID:nL4N0BL1FF].

“I think it will not be possible to hold elections in June because a lot of things have to be done before the election,” Carter, 88, told Reuters after a meeting with the head of the interim government, election commission and political party leaders.

Nepal needs to update the voters’ list and amend several election related laws. Officials say this could take time as the government needs to hold talks with small political parties that are disrupting the collection of the voters’ rolls.

Carter said next window for the polls was November after the end of the annual monsoon rains.

The election will produce a special Constituent Assembly tasked to draft Nepal’s first constitution after the abolition of the monarchy. The previous assembly was dissolved last year without completing the work.

Carter, who travels widely to conduct peace negotiations, is scheduled to leave for Myanmar on Tuesday on a visit amid concerns over rising religious violence there.

(Reporting by Gopal Sharma; Editing by Rosalind Russell)

Hundreds of refugees from the Chinese province of Tibet cross treacherous mountain passes to reach Nepal each year, but as the influence of China grows in its impoverished neighbor, their passage is becoming increasingly difficult.

In the past, Tibetan exiles captured by Nepali police were handed to the United Nation’s High Commissioner for Refugees for their onward journey to India, where the Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama lives in exile.

But the U.S. statesman said Tibetan exiles were now facing harassment at the border, and called on the government to resist pressure to impede the movement of refugees.

“My hope is that the Nepali government will not accede,” he told reporters.

Sandwiched between emerging giants China and India, Nepal has been courted by both its powerful neighbors as it tries to find its feet after a decade-long civil war that ended in 2006.

Nepal is home to around 20,000 Tibetans who have fled Chinese rule in their remote region. In recent years, the Nepali government has crushed protests by Tibetans against China, the country’s top donor and key trade partner.

A Tibetan exile set himself on fire and died last month while another also tried to self-immolate but was overpowered last year.

The former president, whose Carter Center observed Nepal’s last elections in 2008, arrived last week to encourage political parties to conduct delayed national elections and to push forward a peace process following the war. Carter said his organization would again observe the polls expected this year.

Last month, political parties appointed the chief justice as the head of a caretaker government to hold elections in June after they failed to agree on a politician for the job.

“I think it will not be possible to hold elections in June because a lot of things have to be done before the election,” Carter, 88, told Reuters after a meeting with the head of the interim government, election commission and political party leaders.

Nepal needs to update the voters’ list and amend several election related laws. Officials say this could take time as the government needs to hold talks with small political parties that are disrupting the collection of the voters’ rolls.

Carter said next window for the polls was November after the end of the annual monsoon rains.

The election will produce a special Constituent Assembly tasked to draft Nepal’s first constitution after the abolition of the monarchy. The previous assembly was dissolved last year without completing the work.

Carter, who travels widely to conduct peace negotiations, is scheduled to leave for Myanmar on Tuesday on a visit amid concerns over rising religious violence there.

(Reporting by Gopal Sharma; Editing by Rosalind Russell)

Yuichiro Miura climbed to the summit of the 8,850 meter (29,035 ft) mountain in 2003 and 2008. He skied down Everest from an altitude of 8,000 meters (26,246 ft) in 1970.

Miura and a nine-person team will climb up the standard southeast ridge route, pioneered by Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay when they became the first people to reach the summit in May 1953.

“The record is not so important for me,” the white-haired Miura told Reuters in the Nepali capital, Kathmandu, before setting out for the mountain.

“It is important to get to the top.”

The record for the oldest person to climb the mountain is held by Nepal’s Min Bahadur Sherchan, who reached the summit at the age of 76, in 2008.

A doctor specializing in heart ailments is in the team to keep an eye on Miura’s health. The group hopes to summit in May.

Miura has skied down the highest mountains on each of the seven continents, and is merely following family tradition. His late father, Keizo Miura, skied down Europe’s Mont Blanc at the age of 99.

“If you wish strongly, have courage and endurance, then you can get to the summit of your dream,” said Miura.

He already has a new dream. He wants to ski down Cho Oyu, the world’s sixth highest mountain at 8,201 meters (26,906 ft), also in the Himalayas.

“Maybe, when I become 85 years old, and if I stay alive, I want to climb and ski down Cho Oyu,” Miura said. “It is my next dream.”

About 4,000 climbers have been to the top of Everest and about 240 people have died on its slopes.

(Reporting by Gopal Sharma; Editing by Elaine Lies and Robert Birsel)