By HT Reporter
Kathmandu, Jan 3: Greater Nepal Nationalist Front has criticised Sino-India agreement on using the Lipulek route to reach Mansarovar without consulting Nepal.
Issuing a press statement on Friday, Front’s chairman Phanidra Nepal termed the accord ‘unjust’ and ‘illegal’, and called upon Nepali people to raise their voice against it.
On December 18, China and India reached a six-point consensus on their border issues, including resumption of Kailash Mansarovar Yatra, cross-border river cooperation and Nathula border trade.
There were speculations that Nepal government would raise this matter with its neighbours as the government under Sushil Koirala did when the two nations made a pact using Lipulek for bilateral trade in 2015.
However, government spokesperson and Minister for Communications and Information Technology Prithvi Subba Gurung on December 27 claimed that China-India accord would not undermine Nepal’s sovereignty.
Gurung said that the Cabinet held an intense discussion and concluded that ‘the agreement was not done in a way to affect our map. “That is a technical matter of theirs since the beginning.”
But the Front has slammed the government’s reactions as ‘irresponsible’. “This shows that the government is not committed to and serious about the territorial integrity.
“India and China have blatantly ignored Nepal’s sovereignty,” claimed the Front that has been demanding the return of Nepali territories annexed to India following Sugauli Treaty between Nepal and the then British India in the aftermath of Anglo-Nepal War (1814-1816 AD).
