India and Nepal agree to renegotiate 1950 pact

Описание: (16 Sep 2008) SHOTLIST
1. Wide of press briefing by Indian Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon
2. Cutaway reporters
3. SOUNDBITE (English): Shivshankar Menon, Indian Foreign Secretary:
"The treaty (1950 Indo-Nepal Friendship treaty) really reflects the nature of our relationship. Both Nepal and India have changed, so has the nature of the relationship over time, so that it is necessary for us to look at the treaty and see how we can update it. Our general approach is to see how we can actually build on and improve upon what we have, and to see how much more we can do. But I can't predict today where we will come to at the end of a review where both of us sit and look at this and see."
4. Nepalese Foreign Minister Upendra Yadav taking his seat at news conference
5. Cutaway security
6. SOUNDBITE (English): Upendra Yadav, Nepalese Foreign Minister:
"We have to upgrade it (1950 treaty). We have to revise it in order to make our friendship of both countries stronger. We have to rethink about it, we have to upgrade it, we have to revise it and if we need new treaty also, then it will be done."
7. Wide of presser
8. SOUNDBITE (English): Shivshankar Menon, Indian Foreign Secretary:
"Flood control is an issue. Prime Minister extended his sympathy to the Nepalese side for the damage on their side and also promised 20 crore (200 million) rupees (4.2 million US dollars) as immediate flood relief to the Nepalese side for use to help the victims of the recent floods."
9. Wide of briefing
STORYLINE
India and Nepal on Tuesday agreed to renegotiate a 1950 pact which Nepal says gives its giant neighbour a dominant role in its affairs, officials said.
The agreement came during the first visit to India of Nepal's new Prime Minister Prachanda, who gave up a decade-long communist insurgency in the Himayalan nation, and assumed power last month.
India, which borders Nepal on three sides, has traditionally had a major influence on Nepal's political and economic affairs.
Both India and Nepal are Hindu majority nations and Nepal gets all its oil products and most of its consumer goods from India.
"Times have changed and we have to upgrade the 1950 treaty," Nepalese Foreign Minister Upendra Yadav told reporters on Tuesday following official talks between the prime ministers of the two countries.
He however, declined to go into details, saying the foreign secretaries of the two sides will take up the review soon.
Landlocked Nepal also has to depend on India to move cargo and passenger traffic.
"The treaty really reflects the nature of our relationship. Both Nepal and India have changed, so has the nature of the relationship over time, so that it is necessary for us to look at the treaty and see how we can update it," said Shivshankar Menon, India's top bureaucrat in the External Affairs Ministry.
India has also promised 200 million rupees (4.2 million US dollars) as immediate flood relief to its neighbour.
The two countries faced devastating floods following a breach in the embankment of the Kosi river in Nepal.
Prachanda met Indian President Pratibha Patil, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, leader of governing Congress party, Sonia Gandhi, and the leader of the opposition, Lal Krishna Advani, during his stay in the Indian capital.
He is scheduled to visit Bangalore, India's information technology hub, on Wednesday.
Prachanda, whose real name is Pushpa Kamal Dahal, took the office of prime minister in August following elections in April this year.
The Constituent Assembly declared Nepal a republic, abolishing the centuries-old monarchy, in May.

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