<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/2022111015114/636d058b9c7e80680e0a5f12jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1500" height="1000"/><figcaption>Then Health Minister Hridayesh Tripathi receiving the first batch of 348,000 doses of Covishield AstraZeneca vaccines from the UN Resident Coordinator in Nepal Sara Beysolow Nyanti in March. The remaining 1.92 million doses promised by COVAX never arrived. Photo: UN</figcaption></figure>As a previously unknown mystery disease caused by the novel coronavirus struck Planet Earth in the winter of 2019-20, public health officials and the World Health Organization (WHO) recommended universal mask wearing, physical distancing, lockdowns and travel restrictions, while awaiting the arrival of preventive vaccines and effective therapies.On two sides of the Atlantic, two contrasting approaches emerged to tackle what came to be known as the Covid-19 pandemic.On the one hand, there was the erratic and eccentric Donald Trump (seconded by his Brazilian buddy Jair Bolsonaro) who denied the seriousness of the pandemic or peddled his “genius” discovery of miscellaneous medications and magical cures like injecting disinfectants into human body or irradiating patients’ bodies with UV light.Blaming China and WHO was Trump’s fallback position to hide his own policy failures. But he also invested billions of dollars to bankroll several American pharmaceutical companies to speed up the production of Covid vaccines through his Operation Warp Speed.Consistent with his ‘America First’ priority, the vaccines were meant primarily for Americans, of course, though any leftovers could be sold or given away to friendly countries abroad depending on the MAGA Leader’s mood and magnanimity.On the other side of the Atlantic, at the urging of the WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom, many European leaders took a seemingly more enlightened global approach. Recognising that “no one is safe until everyone is safe”, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and their fellow Nordic counterparts declared that they would eschew “vaccine nationalism” and embrace the concept of a Covid vaccine as a ‘global public good’ to be made available equitably to all countries. The United Nations, the developing world, civil society organisations and celebrities welcomed this enlightened approach.Encouraged by this idealistic vision, WHO launched a clumsily worded but ambitious ‘Access to Covid-19 Tools (ACT) Accelerator’ that would speed up the development, production, and equitable access to Covid-19 tests, treatment, and vaccines. The ACT Accelerator brought together a grand alliance of governments, scientists, businesses, civil society, and philanthropists, including the Gates Foundation, GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance, the Global Fund, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), the World Bank, Unicef.It was a who’s who of the global health partnership. The most important ‘pillar’ of the ACT Accelerator was the ‘COVID-19 Vaccines Global Access’, abbreviated as <a href="https://www.who.int/initiatives/act-accelerator/covax" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">COVAX</a>.COVAX is hosted and administered by GAVI, and its main vaccine procurement and delivery partner is Unicef. A high-level COVAX Coordinating Mechanism with representation of a cross-section of its partners and multiple technical groups is responsible for ensuring equitable allocation and access to Covid-19 vaccines worldwide.Participating in COVAX are two groups of countries: the fully self-financing high-income countries (HICs), and nearly 100 low and middle-income countries (LMICs) that generally rely on donor funding to receive some vaccines, but can also purchase some more with their own resources.A mechanism called the Advance Market Commitment (AMC) through which GAVI guarantees the purchase of a large quantity of vaccines to incentivise manufacturers to produce doses and sell them at an affordable price. Initially, the donors were expected to capitalise on the COVAX facility with a contribution of $9 billion to purchase and distribute 2 billion doses of vaccines to meet the needs of some 20% of high-risk groups in participating countries, including frontline health workers and senior citizens.Launched with much fanfare in April 2020, long before there were any viable vaccines, COVAX was hailed as a futuristic model of enlightened international cooperation to ensure that vaccine development and delivery would progress at ‘a speed, scale, and access never before seen in human history’.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/2022111015114/636d058e9c7e80680e0a5f13jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1226" height="678">Realpolitik of vaccine nationalismWhile most poorer countries <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/when-will-nepals-covid-vaccine-turn-come/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">patiently waited for COVAX to be fully-functional</a>, most richer countries, particularly the G-7 and EU members, decided to jump the queue and cut bilateral deals for their own citizens. Not to be left behind in the competition for public relations and profits, China, India and Russia, the three major vaccine producers outside Western Europe and the US, engaged in carefully orchestrated ‘<a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/jabs-and-jab-nots/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">vaccine diplomacy</a>’ to bolster their image of solidarity with LMICs.COVAX remained under-funded and unable to compete with the HICs that quickly reserved huge quantities of vaccines directly from the manufacturers, often exceeding their actual requirements. By August 2020, the Trump administration had signed seven bilateral deals with six companies for more than 800 million doses, enough to vaccinate 140% of its population.The Biden administration substantially increased this. The EU was not far behind in reserving half a billion doses secured through two deals. The UK signed five bilateral deals for 270 million doses, equivalent to 225% of its population. Canada was at the head of the class reserving four times more vaccines than the total requirement for its population.These bilateral deals severely undercut COVAX’s ambition of becoming the global coordinator of vaccine procurement, allocation and distribution. By the time it managed to secure the $8.3 billion it needed to procure and deliver the promised vaccines to 92 poorer countries in June 2021, manufacturers had no more vaccines to sell, as practically all their production was contractually committed to the HICs.COVAX was caught in a Catch-22. Whereas initially it did not have enough money to buy the vaccines, now it has the money but there are no vaccines in the market. Besides HICs hoarding a huge cache of excess vaccines, two other problems are responsible for the global vaccine shortage.The huge <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/first-signs-of-the-second-wave/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">second wave</a> of Covid infection in India in the Spring of 2021 led it to ban the export of the AstraZeneca Covishield vaccine manufactured by the Serum Institute of India (SII). This was a huge shock and disappointment for both COVAX and most lower-income countries like Nepal. They were counting on SII, the world’s largest vaccine producer, to be their main supplier.<a style="font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/south-asias-vaccine-geopolitics/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">South Asia's vaccine geopolitics</a>, Christopher TanBut an even bigger and more systemic problem is the unwillingness of a handful of Big Pharma to give up their exclusive patent rights to produce life-saving vaccines and medications. Although the World Trade Organization’s Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) provides for waiving patent rights in the case of life-saving medicines and vaccines, in public health emergencies like global pandemics, most HICs have refused to grant such waivers.President Biden did express a willingness to consider waiving the intellectual property rights for Covid  vaccines. But the same European leaders who loudly proclaimed Covid vaccines as ‘global public goods’, have stubbornly and hypocritically resisted waiving the IP rights of their pharmaceutical companies.The hypocrisy is compounded because billions of dollars, euros and pounds of public funds were given to private Big Pharma companies to accelerate research and development of new vaccines for which they now claim exclusive patent rights to maximise profits for their private shareholders.The G-7 charade There were high hopes that the G-7 Summit of the world’s richest democratic countries in Cornwall in June 2021 would lead to a breakthrough in Covid response, revive COVAX and accelerate delivery of vaccines to developing countries. While the absence of an arrogant and unpredictable Trump created an atmosphere of congenial camaraderie at the G-7, its outcome was long in lofty rhetoric but woefully short in concrete and urgent action to tackle the global pandemic.The IMF had estimated that an investment of $55 billion now would not only save the lives and protect the health of millions, but would help revive the world economy and yield a return of $9 trillion by 2025. Sadly, the G-7 accounting for 60% of the world’s economy did not pledge even 6% of the investment recommended by the IMF.The G-7 commitment to donate less than one billion doses of the surplus vaccine they have hoarded, and that too over an extended period stretching well into mid-2022, was a huge disappointment in the face of a dramatic surge of newer and deadlier Covid variants <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/we-knew-the-tsunami-was-approaching/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">ravaging countries like Nepal</a>, much of Southeast Asia and the African continent.COVAX estimates that it needs 2 billion doses in 2021 to reach the most vulnerable 20% of people in the developing world, and 11 billion doses to reach herd immunity by 2022. Alas, if current trends continue, if TRIPS patent waiver is not granted and technology transfer not facilitated to vastly increase and diversify vaccine production in many more countries, it might take decades before people in LMICs can expect to reach herd immunity.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/2022111015114/636d05919c7e80680e0a5f14jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1220" height="664">The People's Vaccine Alliance estimates that, at the current rate, low-income countries could take 57 years to fully vaccinate their populations, whereas G-7 countries are likely to reach that milestone in the next 6 months.Contrary to the mantra of ‘vaccine equity’ chanted ad nauseum at the UN, at WHO, and at COVAX, the action and inaction of the G-7 actually promote vaccine nationalism. As the Secretary-General of the UN and Director-General of WHO have pointed out, vaccine nationalism in rich countries (and more recently in India) are perpetuating a two-tier world. Of the 2.1 billion Covid-19 vaccine doses administered worldwide so far, only 4% were provided to poorer countries by COVAX.As UN Secretary-General António Guterres has noted poignantly, “Today, ten countries have administered 75% of all COVID-19 vaccines, but, in poor countries, health workers and people with underlying conditions cannot access them. This is not only manifestly unjust, it is also self-defeating.”COVAX and an unequal world COVAX has been criticised harshly for making tall promises but failing to deliver. As a bold and nascent initiative, it is going through teething problems, and has made some mistakes and miscalculations. GAVI that administers COVAX, made some early compromises on its egalitarian founding principles by agreeing to certain double standards applied to the HICs vs LMICs.For example, it allowed donor countries like the UK and Canada to pick and choose which vaccines they preferred to fund or purchase for themselves through COVAX rather than requiring their funding to be co-mingled as part of COVAX’s funding pool for all countries and products.There was some consternation when the UK and Canada managed to purchase through COVAX fairly large quantities of their chosen vaccines, despite the fact that they had already procured plenty of vaccines through direct bilateral contracts with several vaccine manufacturers, even as COVAX was struggling to deliver minimal quantities of vaccines for LMICs.Canada managed to procure through COVAX 1.6 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine while Nepal (a country of similar population size) only received 348,000 doses. An added irony is that some of those AZ vaccines in Canada remain unused and are on the verge of expiry, whereas 1.4 million senior citizens in Nepal are desperately waiting for their second jab of the AZ vaccine.Some of these examples go to show that notwithstanding the lofty principles underlying the enlightened concept of COVAX, we still live in a world where, as the old saying goes, ‘one who pays the piper calls the tune’. On a larger scale, a similar situation prevails at the United Nations, where the principle of ‘sovereign equality of all member states’ is rendered meaningless by five veto-wielding permanent members of the Security Council, and a handful of other influential donors.Despite such shortcomings, the UN, COVAX and other initiatives are important building blocks towards a fairer world of greater human solidarity. Imperfect as they are, humanity is better off with such organisations striving to harness the power of partnership and solidarity than a dog-eat-dog world driven solely by narrow national or other parochial interests.Some of the weaknesses and hypocrisy seen in the early functioning of COVAX are not the result of its model being wrong, but because some of its key sponsors not playing by agreed rules.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/2022111015114/636d05949c7e80680e0a5f15jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1442" height="588">In a world of sovereign nation-states, leaders have a legitimate responsibility to protect their own populations first. Hence vaccine nationalism is understandable and should have been built into the design of initiatives like COVAX from the start -- although pursuing vaccine equity must be its ultimate objective.Without putting all our eggs in the COVAX basket, and while exploring all other options to meet our urgent vaccine needs, it is in the interest of countries like Nepal to help build a more robust COVAX to help the world better cope with future pandemics.<a href="http://www.kulgautam.org/" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.kulgautam.org/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1625197419711000&amp;usg=AFQjCNFM7lv53rOVMJQdg4WABZK4M09vvw">Kul Chandra Gautam</a>, a Nepali diplomat, is a former Assistant Secretary-General of the UN and Deputy Executive Director of Unicef. He is also the author of Global Citizen from Gulmi: My Journey from the Hills of Nepal to the Halls of the United Nations. He was also a board member of GAVI.

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Hope, hyperbole and hypocrisy of COVAX

<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221129151140/638619f99c7e80680e0cccd3jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="400" height="533"/><figcaption>Illustration: DIWAKAR CHETTRI</figcaption></figure>US President Donald Trump has pulled his country out of the World Health Organisation (WHO) citing its pro-China bias in dealing with COVID-19. (At least Trump says he has left the WHO, as with many of the president’s statements — remember the wall with Mexico? — reality can play out differently.)But even if this time Trump has accurately predicted what he will do, the global order did not just die. The pandemic might be stretching it like never before but many examples show that it is intact.For every confrontation that makes headlines, there are acts of cooperation that go unnoticed: the US prevents 3M from exporting masks, Washington and Ottawa agree to extend an agreement to keep their border closed till 21 June, when Trump <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/pompeo-accuses-who-of-failing-in-basic-duty/" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/pompeo-accuses-who-of-failing-in-basic-duty/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1591492305679000&amp;usg=AFQjCNGnM-BCJh0YtceNmtprsPQrb_GjyA">froze funds to the WHO</a> before announcing the US’ withdrawal, Finland boosted its contribution.Of course, you can argue that such acts of cooperation are motivated by self-interest, but what is not in global relations? Governments create multinational organisations and sign treaties in the expectation that together they will be stronger – better able to prevent annihilation via wars, more effective at preventing the hole in the ozone layer from growing — and that individual nations and citizens will benefit.Development assistance is pledged in the hope that its recipients one day will become players in the global, wealth-generating trading system, which, at least in theory, benefits all participants. (More cynically, donor countries ‘tie’ aid to receiving countries doing business with their own manufacturers).Trump has also announced that the US will withdraw from the Open Skies treaty, which permits governments to conduct unarmed surveillance flights over 35 states, including Russia. Are you seeing a theme here? A huge chunk of the ‘COVID has killed cooperation’ thinking is based on events originating in Washington, and while the US president is undoubtedly influencing fellow leaders from Orban to Bolsanaro, as with many Trump-related issues, bombast overpowers behaviour.Here in Nepal, the US was one of the first governments to provide aid to Kathmandu, in March, to fight the outbreak. Many others have followed: China, <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/uk-support-to-help-strengthen-nepals-response-to-covid-19/" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/uk-support-to-help-strengthen-nepals-response-to-covid-19/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1591492305679000&amp;usg=AFQjCNGgvaCgocoaHlFxd1vxJZNNQUWkeQ">Britain</a>, Germany, India, Qatar, <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/10000-covid-19-test-kits-to-nepal-from-singapore/" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/10000-covid-19-test-kits-to-nepal-from-singapore/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1591492305679000&amp;usg=AFQjCNEdpD4HEu6SqdPPUQ4x__WapVM0vQ">Singapore</a>, <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/swiss-pcrs-for-nepal-covid-19-testing/" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/swiss-pcrs-for-nepal-covid-19-testing/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1591492305679000&amp;usg=AFQjCNGWnIC4n8J6DhbVOCs7aq_2AZbb7g">Switzerland</a>, UAE, even Burma. Yes, Nepal’s powerful neighbours India and China are both continually vying for influence here, and Switzerland and Germany are long-time donors, but if these governments were motivated solely by self-interest would they not be retreating into their own crisis-ridden states rather than assisting Nepal, where only 11 people have died to date of the coronavirus?France and Germany have proposed a €500 billion European Union rescue fund that would benefit mainly southern EU states like Spain, Greece and Italy, which have been devastated by the virus. Those governments would not have to repay the money. Of course the move, which still needs to be agreed by all members, is also motivated by self-interest — any failing nation will drag down all EU members — but if agreed the deal would mark a major response that belies the prevailing ‘charity begins at home’ narrative popular in these times.The international response to the pandemic includes $44 million deposited by governments into the United Nations COVID-19 Response and Recovery Fund, $217 million into the WHO Solidarity Fund, and €7.4 billion pledged for vaccine research. Even USAID has announced $99 million in global emergency health funding. Countries have anted up to finance a global response to the pandemic but as usual in times of crisis it's, not enough. WHO has reported it is $900 million short of the $1.7 billion it will need to respond to the virus in 2020.The WHO has become another flashpoint in US-China relations, which have soured in a trade war since Trump took office in 2017. President Xi Jinping used the recent meeting of the World Health Association, the decision-making body of the WHO, as a platform to pledge $2 billion over two years to help nations fight COVID-19, which dwarfs the roughly $500-million US contribution to the global health body.More than 100 countries are participating in <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/opinion/countries-cooperating-to-find-covid-19-cure/" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.nepalitimes.com/opinion/countries-cooperating-to-find-covid-19-cure/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1591492305679000&amp;usg=AFQjCNE5Gy3XfqxCIHQpT1qL_fZJbCIp-Q">WHO’s Solidarity Trial</a> to speed up development of a vaccine, and in May 140 world leaders, including South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and former UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown, signed a letter calling for all virus vaccines, treatments and tests to be patent-free, mass produced and distributed fairly.These actions seem to signify that much of the world agrees that just as the virus threat is global, the response too must be international.

Marty Logan

WHO and US

<img width="1592" height="820" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109121112/636b8bbd9c7e80680e06b2bcjpeg.jpg" alt=""/>		US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has defended President Donald Trump withholding funding to the World Health Organisation (WHO) saying the UN body had “not been responsible” in handling the COVID-19 pandemic.In a conference call from Washington DC on Thursday with five editors from Central and South Asia, Pompeo said the United States would lead the international response to the disease to address the health and economic challenges for countries including Nepal, India and the rest of the region.Asked by Nepali Times why the United States was scapegoating the WHO at a time when international cooperation was most needed to find antidotes to the disease, Pompeo replied: “We are not scapegoating the WHO, we are executing the mission to protect citizens. It has not lived up to its responsibility ... it has failed in its basic duty, and when the organisation fails we will find another mechanism.”The United States provided $400 million to the WHO last year, and is one of its biggest donors. Trump’s pause in funding is expected to last 2-3 months and will reportedly be resumed after a review of the agency’s activities.He said the United States has delivered more than $500 million to help countries all over the world through USAID and the State Department to fight the pandemic, and that does not including WHO. He did not repeat President Trump’s accusation on Tuesday that the WHO was “pro-China”, but said that Beijing had not disclosed facts and data pertaining to the outbreak and that China had to “open up and be held accountable”.On Wednesday, in an interview with Fox News, Pompeo urged China “to come clean on exactly how the virus spread”. There has been speculation that virus could have leaked out of the labs of the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which is located near the wet market where the infections started. The WHO has repeatedly denied that the novel coronavirus was made in a lab, and has maintained that it is natural and jumped from bats to humans through another mammal host, likely pangolins.On Thursday, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian dismissed Pompeo’s remarks,  telling a press briefing in Beijing: “Officials of the World Health Organization have repeatedly said there's no evidence the virus was made in a lab, and many experts have also said the claim lacks scientific proof.”During his conference call on Thursday, Pompeo was also asked if he thought that the pandemic would result in the global power balance to shift from the United States to China becoming number one. He replied: “The United States, the world’s democracies and freedom-loving people will come out of this far better than authoritarian countries. It is not accurate to say that countries with central authority have been able to deal with a global pandemic like this better than democracies. America will be at the front to meet the challenge and lead it.”He added that India and the United States were coordinating their efforts in responding to the pandemic in medical equipment and drugs. But he said the crisis had not stopped the two countries in continuing to address the bigger issues like the Indo-Pacific partnership, trade and “the challenges that China poses”.The US move to stop funding to WHO for being “China-centric” has come under widespread criticism from world leaders, and critics have said President Trump is trying to deflect the blame for his lapses that allowed the pandemic to spread across the country. The United States now has nearly a third of the 2.1 million coronavirus cases worldwide, and has recorded 28,500 deaths from the disease so far.

Pompeo accuses WHO of "failing in basic duty"

Recent outrage in Sikkim over an Indian Army expedition climbing <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/saving-kangchenjunga">Kangchenjunga</a>, the world’s third-highest peak, has spiked attention to the need to balance mountaineering jobs with indigenous reverence for sacred landmarks. Kangchenjunga (8,586m) is not a peak as much as it is a mountain range with 16 peaks above 7,000m on the border between India and Nepal -- the word itself means ‘five treasures of the snows’ in Tibetan. Some of the highest prominences like Kangchenjunga West and Kangbachen are in Nepal, while the Main, Central and South Peaks are on the border. Climbing the peak from the Indian side has been banned since 2001 because the indigenous Lepcha community there regard the mountain as the abode of Dzoe-nga, the patron deity of Sikkim, which was an independent Himalayan Kingdom until it was annexed by India in 1975.&nbsp; Buddhists in Sikkim say their saint, Padmasambhava, recognised the mountain as a protective spirit. The state has declared the base of the mountain Kangchenjunga National Park, which covers an area one-third of Sikkim. ‘The act of scaling this sacred peak is not only a matter of serious concern but also a violation of both the prevailing legal provisions and the deeply held religious beliefs of the people of Sikkim,’ read a letter from Chief Minister Prem Singh Tamang (Golay) to Amit Shah, India’s Minister of Home Affairs and Cooperation.&nbsp; Tamang continued: ‘We further request Your Honour to take up the issue with the Government of Nepal to ensure that no future expeditions are permitted on the sacred mountain, in deference to the deeply held beliefs and cultural values of the people of Sikkim.’ Kangchenjunga was climbed for the first time exactly 70 years ago by a British team who told King Tashi Namgyal, the Choegyal of Sikkim, that they would not set foot on the summit. Since then, there have been about 532 successful climbs of the peaks and 52 have died while trying.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250628060616_5c268e08cf49f36b79ef9b31933fc2d9bf9a6f65414e7ca06dd028bf04e7ccc1.png" data-media-id="editor_1" data-image-id="20250628060616_5c268e08cf49f36b79ef9b31933fc2d9bf9a6f65414e7ca06dd028bf04e7ccc1" data-rendition-name="original" width="1782" height="1178" loading="lazy" alt="Kangchenjunga: too sacred to climb NT"> <figcaption>Indigenous communities in Sikkim held purification ceremonies following the Indian expedition to Kangchenjunga. Photo: THE VOICE OF SIKKIM / FACEBOOK</figcaption> </figure>  <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/peak-climbing-season-2025-s4abrxny">This spring climbing season</a> alone, there were 70 climbing permits for foreigners issued for Kangchenjunga by the Nepal government, and made it to the top while one French climber died.&nbsp; One of the expeditions this year was an Indian Army team led by Col Ranveer Jamwal, who has summited the highest peaks on all seven continents, and Mt Everest thrice. Jamwal’s team was on the final leg of a ‘<a href="https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/india/nimas-summits-mt-kangchenjunga-concludes-historic-har-shikhar-tiranga-mission-successfully/articleshow/121341315.cms?from=mdr">Har Shikhar Tiranga</a>’ (The Tricolour on Every Peak) mission to plant the Indian flag at the highest points of each of India’s 28 states. Kanchenjunga was the last peak they had left, and the hardest, but the expedition put five climbers on the summit. What seems to have incensed the Sikkimese is that while it has banned climbing the mountain from its side, it was an Indian military expedition that went to Nepal to climb the mountain. After news broke of the climb in May, the Sikkim Indigenous Lepcha Tribal Association asked people to observe purification ceremonies in temples across the state. Mayalmit Lepcha of the association acknowledged that the Sikkim government was also partly at fault: “I don’t think such an expedition could have gone forward without the state government being informed, so it could have done something to intervene. It shows weakness. What’s done is done, all we can do is carry out these sanctification ceremonies.”&nbsp; In 2000, one year before Sikkim’s ban, the state allowed an Austrian team to attempt Kanchenjunga’s northeast face for a fee of $20,000, on agreement that they would stop 10m before the summit. Despite this, there was outrage over the expedition on the grounds that it violated Indian laws regarding the defiling of religious sites and Sikkim’s rights to maintain its culture after merging with India. The Indian Army expedition was also seen to have circumvented Sikkim’s law and violated religious sensibilities by going through Nepal. While the team may have thought they were respecting Sikkim’s beliefs by finding a way to complete the mission, the people of Sikkim saw it as defilement.&nbsp; The somber mood of the Sikkim people at the ritual contrasts sharply with Jamwal’s sense of accomplishment. “Without a doubt, the most difficult summit of my life,” he told reporters after the climb. “It tested every ounce of our will.”&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250628060616_ccfe079c78dab788d19fe2080ee8a5d5dcb11de4157316f6d94e5964da097157.jpg" data-media-id="editor_4" data-image-id="20250628060616_ccfe079c78dab788d19fe2080ee8a5d5dcb11de4157316f6d94e5964da097157" data-rendition-name="original" width="787" height="377" loading="lazy" alt="Kangchenjunga: too sacred to climb NT"> <figcaption>Prayer flags along the Sikkim-Kangchenjunga trekking route. Photo: TREKKINGININDIA.COM</figcaption> </figure>  The <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/the-rise-and-fall-of-nims-purja">controversial Nepali-British mountaineer Nirmal Purja</a> was also on Kangchenjunga this spring the mountain, on a mission to summit all 14 8,000m peaks for a third time. He echoed Jamwal about the tough conditions: “The conditions above camp were extremely tough, with deep snow and challenging terrain—more crevasses than usual.” Nepal’s government has not said anything publicly, but it is unlikely that it will ban climbing on Kangchenjunga, since it is becoming popular with expeditions because of its technical challenges, and overcrowding on Mt Everest. Nepal does have bans in place for some of its mountains out of respect for local beliefs. <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/to-open-machapuchre-for-mountaineering-or-not">Mt Machapuchre</a> (6,990m) the imposing pyramid that looms over Pokhara, for example, is seen as an icon of purity by the Gurung people and a symbol of Vishnu by the Hindu communities who live at its base. A strict climbing ban has been in place since 1957, when a British expedition led by Col Jimmy Roberts stopped 45m short of the summit – either because the last bit was too difficult or out of deference to local sentiments.&nbsp; Khumbila that stands above Namche Bazar is only 5,761m high, but like Kanchenjunga is considered the protector deity of the Sherpa people. Gauri Shankar on the Nepal-China border, called Chomo Tseringma by the local community, was off-limits between 1965 and 1979 due to its association with Lord Shiva and Gauri, his consort. Although expeditions are now allowed, there are not too many takers. In Tibet, climbing Mount Kailash is prohibited by the Chinese government because it revered by the Hindus, Buddhists and followers of the Bon faith. Even Mt Everest is regarded as sacred, and its Sherpa name is Chomolungma, Goddess Mother of the Earth.&nbsp; Economically, climbs on Kanchenjunga bring in decent revenue. This climbing season, the 41 permits, at $1,800 each, brought in $73,800. This is somewhat comparable to Makalu, Lhotse, and Annapurna I, but these numbers are dwarfed by the $4 million in <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/the-everest-industry">Everest permits</a>. Revenue from Kanchenjunga climbing permits is something Nepal could potentially forgo if necessary, but the expeditions also provide jobs to hundreds of high altitude guides, porters, base camp support staff and other logistical costs.&nbsp; As the third highest mountain in the world and the tallest in India, there will always be significant motivation to climb it from the Nepal side, especially as climbers are drawn by the technical climbing at high altitude.

Kangchenjunga: too sacred to climb?

The monsoon this year arrived on time, and brought life-giving rain — irrigating paddy terraces, recharging groundwater, reviving springs, and increasing electricity generation.
But Nepal has to deal with either too much water or too little. On a clear April day before the monsoon, the hills of Sindhuli district were parched, and there were wildfires burning out of control. There had been no rain for the past six months.
And that has been the perennial crisis for Nepal’s farmers: that 85% of the rainfall occurs during just four months of the monsoon with little rain for the other eight months.&nbsp;
The water crisis is related to the powerful changes sweeping the mid-hill region of Nepal. With better roads, higher incomes and more exposure, many residents now aspire to have the kind of water supply seen in urban homes. They want hot or cold water at the turn of a tap, showers and flush tank toilets.&nbsp;
To meet this rising demand, many local and provincial governments are investing in large water supply projects often by lifting water from rivers hundreds of metres down the mountain. But these new systems may not be sustainable in the long run.
Many villages in Sindhuli are switching from local springs to piped systems, and even in rural homes, overhead tanks are becoming common.
But this new convenience comes with big challenges. Lifting water from rivers far below requires long pipes, electric pumps, and constant maintenance. These systems are costly, and the streams themselves often shrink to a trickle in the dry months. Big water-lifting schemes look impressive, but there is doubt if they can meet growing water demand.
A much more sustainable solution would be what some communities are doing: restoring old ponds or build new recharge systems. But those villages are exceptions, in most places traditional ponds and wallows are being filled up to be turned into sports fields, or make way for buildings.
Where there are new ponds, they are sometimes in the wrong places or without proper design. Roads and drains are not engineered properly and have increased landslides and erosion. Water management in hilly areas is not just about building things, it is about building in the right way, in the right place.
Traditional water systems were based on nature. They were not perfect, but they used the land wisely. Ponds used to hold rainwater and slowly refill springs which supported families, farms, and forests.&nbsp;
Not everything worked well in the past, but we can learn from traditional water management practices. Across Nepal, some rural municipalities have launched campaigns to store monsoon runoff — either in tanks, ponds or by recharging the aquifers.
But not all efforts have been successful. Some ponds are built without any hydrological study. Some are rushed to meet deadlines rather than real needs.&nbsp;
Now, the Muhan initiative hopes to revive springs to make households more resilient and help farmings. With the financial support of the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research, research is being done to understand how springs work and how they are affected by changes in rainfall, land use, and development.&nbsp;
Instead of just building pipes and tanks, the project maps the entire springshed so we can understand the root cause of water shortage. In Sindhuli, the problem is not the amount of rain, but the loss of natural systems that store it and the social systems that manage water.&nbsp;
Nepal’s towns and villages now face a major challenge: how to manage water all year round as demand rises with people’s living standards. Depending only on river-lift systems is not a sustainable solution.&nbsp;
We need a mix of approaches that help store water from the rainy season to make it available for the rest of the year, whether by directly harvesting rainwater, restoring ponds, managing springsheds, or smart management of demand.
Rural Nepal is also seeing dramatic depopulation. Much of the outmigration can be stemmed if there is easier water supply for agriculture and household use. Across the mid hills, villages are emptying because springs are going dry. Government policy needs to catch up with the reality on the ground, and support solutions that work for people and nature. Every water supply plan should include recharge structures. Every road or building project should consider water flow and erosion. Local governments need more than budgets: they need training, tools, and data.
Ngamindra Dahal is with the Nepal Water Conservation Foundation, Kathmandu. Hemant Ojha collaborated in this piece and is associated with the Australian National University.

Water for Life

The debate about who is less accountable to the public: politicians or bureaucrats is as old as Nepal’s democracy itself.
Some blame politicians for being beholden to the businessmen who finance their electoral campaigns, and are forced to return the favour with contracts and kickbacks when in power.&nbsp;
Others say it is civil servants who are neither civil nor servants, and know the inner workings of the system to exploit loopholes – they then teach ministers, MPs, mayors, or ward chairs which juicy projects can be squeezed. And everyone gets their share.
In reality, it is probably not a case of either, or. Both have their hands deep in the honey pot. Corruption is now such a given that yet another exposé in the mainstream press, like the latest visit-visa scam, does not raise eyebrows anymore.
We may have to edit Lord Acton’s famous quote to say that in Nepal we do not even need absolute power to corrupt absolutely. The ruling cartel has divvied up the spoils, so that no one ever faces charges. The three parties all know about the skeletons rattling in each other’s closets, and they cancel each other out.
Politicians and bureaucrats get all the blame for taking bribes, but what of the givers of bribes? In this crony capitalism, businesses invariably need political patrons in an elaborate <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/nepals-only-growth-industry-private-sector-corruption" target="_blank">national network of give-and-take</a>.
<a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/nepals-only-growth-industry-private-sector-corruption" target="_blank">Politicians and businesses work hand-in-glove</a> so that conflict of interest in contracts, insider trading, cartelling, and non-performing assets of banks become the norm. Our survey after the 2017 local election showed that out of the 753 newly-elected local government chairs, <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/elected-contractors" target="_blank">nearly 300 were contractors</a> involved in sand-mining, quarrying, or transportation syndicates.
Nepal’s tycoons have discovered that instead of donating to election war chests of politicians, it is a much surer return on investment to spend the money to <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/the-business-of-politics-in-nepal" target="_blank">become legislators and politicians themselves</a>.
In democracies, there are checks and balances to control corruption when it becomes endemic. The Nepal Police and Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) are supposed to do the detective work without political interference. The courts are required to be independent in dispensing justice and punishing crooks.
But the less said about the judiciary the better. A writ petition in the Supreme Court last week accused our sister magazine <a href="https://www.himalkhabar.com/" target="_blank">HimalKhabar</a> of contempt of court for two stories: one about how high courts have been overturning a majority of verdicts of district courts in cases of rape, and another about the Biratnagar High Court clearing a self-proclaimed holy man, Krishna Bahadur Giri, of rape despite police presenting physical evidence.
The doctrine of the separation of powers stipulates that it is when the other three pillars in a democracy are compromised that the role of the free press becomes even more vital. The world over, as soon as populist autocrats are elected to the executive, their first order of business is to co-opt the legislature and the judiciary. Then they buy off, intimidate, or neutralise the media with Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation (SLAPP).
Nepal’s officialdom seems to be taking midnight Zoom lessons from other despots on how to gag the media. Last month, popular talk show host Dil Bhushan Pathak was served an arrest warrant by the Kathmandu District Court for <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CntsnTrtG8" target="_blank">a YouTube explainer</a> about the alleged involvement of the son of Foreign Minister Arzu Deuba Rana in a reported purchase of Kathmandu’s Hilton Hotel.
The Lalitpur District Court ruled that Pathak could not be arrested without fair trial, but this week the Kathmandu District Court filed another case against the journalist based on a complaint by the Cyber Bureau, and put him on a fugitive list.&nbsp;
Without going into the veracity of Pathak’s explainer, it is deeply problematic that the Electronic Transaction Act has been invoked – proof that politicians are getting the courts and investigating agencies to make an example of a high profile journalist.&nbsp;
The intention is to silence media investigations into the fake refugee scandal in which the main partner in the ruling coalition is implicated, and in which one of its former home ministers was jailed last year.
The Kathmandu High Court has been mysteriously active in targeting journalists these days. <a href="https://bizmandu.com/" target="_blank">Bizmandu</a> and <a href="https://nepalkhabar.com/" target="_blank">Nepalkhabar</a> were served a notice last month <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/no-freedom-after-expression-y4inku06" target="_blank">to withdraw a story they did</a> on the Chair of the <a href="https://www.sebon.gov.np/" target="_blank">Security and Exchange Board of Nepal (SEBON</a>) Santosh Narayan Shrestha allegedly demanding kickbacks from hydropower investors.&nbsp;
Incredibly, the court even asked the two portals not to report on the subject anymore – a ruling so absurd that the Patan High Court overturned it a week later.&nbsp;
The allegations against Shrestha were made in a public meeting of the <a href="https://www.ippan.org.np/members/3060/bungal-hydro-ltd" target="_blank">Independent Power Producers Association of Nepal (IPPAN)</a>, and MPs demanded a <a href="https://myrepublica.nagariknetwork.com/news/parliament-demands-probe-into-sebon-chairman-over-alleged-commission-demand-40-32.html" target="_blank">Parliament inquiry</a> into the regulator. <a href="https://www.himalkhabar.com/144523/santosh-narayan-shrestha" target="_blank">HimalKhabar</a> reported this week that while Shrestha was reportedly demanding commissions from private investors for IPOs, he cleared primary share sales in Bajhang’s 10.75MW <a href="https://www.ippan.org.np/members/3060/bungal-hydro-ltd" target="_blank">Bungal Hydro</a> in which his family members have investments, company records show.
And then just on Monday, bureaucrats hoodwinked MPs by deleting references in a bill requiring a two-year ‘cooling off’ period under which retiring civil servants could be barred from holding constitutional positions for two years.
The contest for who is more corrupt: bureauacrats, politicians, or the private sector is on.
Kunda Dixit

SLAPPing Democracy

<a href="https://nepalitimes.com/multimedia/the-last-of-the-kusunda">The Kusunda</a> are among the last remaining hunter-gatherer communities left in Nepal, and it has only one fluent speaker left of a language that is not related to any other language group in South Asia.&nbsp; The Kusunda call themselves the King of the Forests ((गेम्येहाक़ in Kusunda,वन राजा in Nepali) and used to have a nomadic lifestyle till recently. But decades of exclusion from mainstream society and modernity have forced the Kusunda to assimilate. &nbsp; Today, most Kusunda live across Nepal’s mid-hills and western plains, choosing to identify themselves as Thakuri and adopting names like Sen, Shahi, and Khan to avoid ostracisation. Over time, inter-ethnic marriages between the Kusunda and other communities became increasingly common.&nbsp; However, the assimilation with other communities also meant that almost no one from the Kusunda community can speak their mother tongue – considered by linguists to be a ‘language isolate’ not related to any other language group in the world, and lacking set rules of grammar that are foundational to other languages. There are no words for ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ in Kusunda, nor are there words to signify direction. There are 23 languages with less than 1,000 speakers listed in Nepal's 2021 census, with Kusunda being the language with the least number of speakers. The number of people who identified as Kusunda has decreased with each subsequent census. Only 253 individuals identified themselves as Kusunda in the last National Census of 2021, down from 273 in 2011.&nbsp; <div class="embed-block"><iframe src="https://creators.spotify.com/pod/show/raithane-bhakha/embed/episodes/Kusundas---the-last-of-the-forest-kings-e23ge6p/a-a9peei1" height="102px" width="400px" frameborder="0" scrolling="no"></iframe></div> The government’s decision to provide a social security stipend to the community for the past few years has prompted many from the Kusunda community to reclaim their identity and in the process, explore their culture and language. Kamala Sen Kusunda, who lives in Dang, is the only fluent native Kusunda speaker alive, although there are now other Kusunda and non-Kusunda people learning how to speak the language. By the time Kamala Sen Kusunda was born in 1975, her family had settled in a village in Rolpa. Although she did not experience the nomadic life of her forebears, she still roamed the forests freely as a child and many of the values and socio-cultural practices of her community were instilled in her and her siblings.&nbsp; This meant that Kamala grew up speaking Kusunda with her family. But by then, the Kusunda had increasingly begun to interact with people beyond their community, and inter-ethnic marriages had become a norm.&nbsp; Kamala herself married at 18 to a 52-year-old man from the Chhetri community. She would go on to have four children, but they were brought up with her husband’s culture and community rather than her own, and teaching them her mother tongue seemed impractical.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250628030648_afaa298bf8ea3b7086e2ed086b11eab463ef2b20a82a4aad74df3dd2e922a4c3.jpg" data-media-id="editor_2" data-image-id="20250628030648_afaa298bf8ea3b7086e2ed086b11eab463ef2b20a82a4aad74df3dd2e922a4c3" data-rendition-name="original" width="855" height="641" loading="lazy" alt="Kusunda NT"> <figcaption>Gyani Maiya Kusunda with Kusunda youth in 2015.</figcaption> </figure>  “If I had spoken my language to them when they were children, they would have learned,” she tells us ruefully. “But they were growing up in a different community, so I never pushed, and they never expressed interest.” At the time, she had other things to worry about, such as earning a livelihood and sustaining her family. To find work, Kamala and her family moved to Shimla in India, where she worked at an apple orchard for six years.&nbsp; Over the next years, Kamala and her family moved back and forth between India and Nepal for work, and Kamala was not actively conversing in the language of her people or being able to connect with members of her community now scattered across Nepal.&nbsp; Had she not forgotten her language after all those years? “How could I forget the language of my ancestors?” she replies. “Not speaking it did not mean that it ceased to be a part of me.”&nbsp; Kamala had been working at a brick kiln in Thimi seven years ago when the National Language Commission tracked her down, offered her a paid position as a Kusunda language consultant and source person for basic language training in Dang.&nbsp; It was there that Kamala met her cousin Gyani Maiya Sen Kusunda, the only other person able to speak Kusunda fluently, who had been working with the Commission to conserve Kusunda language and culture. It was also where Kamala met language researcher and lexicographer Uday Raj Ale. Ale had been in the middle of his research into the Tharu language and community 15 years ago when he met Gyani Maiya Kusunda’s son, who told him that his mother was one of the few people who spoke Kusunda, but that no one had shown an interest in studying and preserving the language and culture. Ale met Gyani Maiya, spending time with her learning and researching Kusunda. By 2017, Ale had collected enough words to put together a Kusunda dictionary. The Kusunda vocabulary currently comprises 2,000 words. His research into the Kusunda language and culture has taken him to every known Kusunda household in Nepal. Although the census puts the number of Kusunda at 253, Ale reckons there are only 158.&nbsp; “Kusunda language is endangered due to its lack of use in everyday life, literature, and religious and socio-cultural practices, as well as the prevalence of inter-ethnic marriages,” explains Ale. In 2019 the Language Commission began its language transfer programs for youth from indigenous communities. Since then, the Commission has completed multiple phases of Kusunda language classes in Dang facilitated by Uday Raj Ale. The classes have 20 students, not just from the Kusunda community, but also interested non-native students.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20250626120632_c6c378bc00af450f2b7f0cf17af1c3b2b6f7b7226927c458c3e01ec389869d33.jpg" data-media-id="editor_3" data-image-id="20250626120632_c6c378bc00af450f2b7f0cf17af1c3b2b6f7b7226927c458c3e01ec389869d33" data-rendition-name="original" width="1485" height="1535" loading="lazy" alt="Kusunda NT"> <figcaption>Students learning Kusunda with instructor Uday Raj Ale (second row, left)</figcaption> </figure>  Khamba Rokaya, who worked as a caretaker for young Kusunda children in Dang, became interested in learning the language as she sat in with the children during their lessons, and for the last few years has been among the few non-native Kusunda language learners in Dang. “I am not from the Kusunda community, but now that I have learned the language, I hope to do my part to carry on the work and share my knowledge with as many people as possible,” she says. “One way to ensure that we preserve this language is to extend its speaker base, both within the Kusunda and non-native communities.” Ale and Kamala have continued to work together since Gyani Maya’s passing in 2020, expanding the Kusunda vocabulary and creating appropriate curricula to fit the needs of the students as their knowledge of Kusunda expands.&nbsp; But without any documentation of Kusunda history, the community’s traditions, stories, values and language were at risk of being lost to time. “The loss of an ethnicity, language or culture in a country is akin to losing a vital organ, and a unique perspective of looking at the world,” says Ale. Which is why Archive Nepal in collaboration with the British Council’s Cultural Protection Fund and the UK’s Department of Culture, Media, and Sport in February launched a book of creative writings in the Kusunda language titled पिन्डा (meaning ‘The First’ in Kusunda): A Compilation of Kusunda Literature. The book is a collection of informative essays about the Kusunda language and culture, short stories that explore themes from nomadic life to universal Nepali experiences of poverty and migration, letters to loved ones, as well as conversational pieces by five Kusunda students ranging from ages 16 to 30. The works in the Kusunda language are also translated into Nepali and English.&nbsp; “Language is an important part of ethnic identity, and our indigenous languages cannot evolve or be conserved unless they are spoken or taught,” said Ale during the launch of the book earlier this year. “But most importantly, language exists as long as there exists literature in that language.” Kamala was in Kathmandu for the launch of the book, and smiled proudly as she looked at the young writers who had contributed to the collection. She said: “I’m glad the young people have chosen to learn and preserve Kusunda. Otherwise, our language would have died with me.” &nbsp;