Kathmandu, Feb. 21
The task force on the
Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) Nepal has concluded that the much-hyped
grant agreement with the United States of America should not be implement as it
was agreed upon.
It has found the
Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) – a bilateral US foreign aid agency
established by the US Congress during George Bush administration in 2004 – had
links with the Indo-Pacific Strategy (IPS).
“The grant agreement must
not be executed in Nepal without changing some of the provisions as it can be
counterproductive in for the country,” said the leader of the task force and
Former Prime Minister Jhala Nath Khanal.
The task force has
submitted its report to the chairmen duo—KP Sharma Oli and Pushpa Kamal Dahal
‘Prachanda’ of the ruling Nepal Communist Party (NCP) on Friday.
It had Minister for
Foreign Affairs Pradeep Kumar Gyawali and Nepal Communist Party (NCP) Standing
Committee Member Bhim Rawal as the members.
However, Khanal did not
disclose the provisions that needed to be amended in the agreement and said
that the content of the report would be made public in three days.
Although the MCA
agreement does not mention about the IPS and has no clear links with the
latter, the task force has found it dubious as various US leaders and senior
military officers had mentioned its links with the controversial US Policy
called IPS which allegedly aims at containing China’s influence in the
Indo-Pacific region.
“For the last three weeks,
we went through multiple documents related to the agreement and execution
procedures and found that there is no mention or link with the IPS,” said
Khanal, “But when the people in the US authority said that the both were
connected, we cannot ignore it. This has created confusion among the people and
leaders”
Regarding the statement
of the US Embassy in Kathmandu that the MCA agreement couldn’t be amended,
leader Khanal said that the pact was not the Bible or Vedas which was beyond
the modification.
The task force has also
found that some of the provisions in the agreement were already amended through
correspondences between Nepal government and MCC.
The report will soon be
presented to the Secretariat Meeting of the NCP, following which the amendment
will be finalised.
The ruling NCP had formed
a task force about three weeks ago to look into the provisions of the MCA grant
agreement after its own central committee members and ministers raised
questions in the pact saying that it would undermine the sovereignty and
interest of the country.
Signed in 2017 after many
years’ effort and meeting the MCC criteria for democracy and development, the
MCA is supposed to bring US$500 million which would be used in constructing the
cross-border electricity transmission lines and upgrading the strategic roads.
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