Police have taken into custody over two dozen professionals including journalists, lawyers and professors o­n Wednesday morning as they were taking out a peaceful rally in defiance of prohibitory orders from New Baneshwore of Kathmandu.

Those arrested include president of Federation of Nepalese Journalists Bishnu Nisthuri, general secretary Mahendra Bista, Chairman of Nepal Bar Association Sambhu Thapa among others.
 
They were arrested o­ne day before the general strike of seven political parties.

April 5, 2006

On March 9, 2006 the royal regime amended the 1990 Labor Act through Ordinance. The workers are crowding the street to oppose the Ordinance as this has curtailed their basic rights. The unions have submitted a joint protest letter and declared their withdrawal from the tripartite Technical Committee formed to draft labor regulations. They have also informed the government not to sit in any dialogue until "the government takes back or annuls the Ordinance and shows written commitment to promulgate any laws, rules and regulations o­nly through tripartite decisions." There are mainly two aspects related to union opposition. The first o­ne is related to the process of declaration of the Ordinance itself. The trade unions, for the past few years, have emphasised o­n the bipartite or tripartite dialogue for reforming labor laws. Their view is that it would be irrational and counterproductive to revise the contents of the Act hurriedly. The point of view held by trade unions is "flexible but fair" labor policy. This also implies that instead of taking social security and labour market flexibility as mutually exclusive "either-or" policy to "the more social security, the more labor market flexibility".

April 05, Katmandu: Alleging so-called Maoists infiltration in the declared General Strike 6-9th April of the Mainstream political parties, the Royal regime has started new wave of suppression against pro-democracy movement in Nepal.