Nepal’s Indigenous peoples victims of abusive conservation policies

Over the past five decades Nepal's Indigenous peoples have suffered a litany of human rights violations including torture and unlawful killings, wrote Amnesty International and the Community Self-Reliance Centre (CSRC) on a report – “Violations in the Name of Conservation”-. The report shows how indigenous peoples are forced to leave their ancestral lands and are denied access to protected areas they depend on as a result of abusive conservation policies. 

Amnesty’s Deputy South Asia Director Dinushika Dissanayake stated that since the 1970’s Nepal’s governments have used an approach to conservation that severely limited indigenous peoples’ ability to access traditional foods, medicinal plants and other resources. 

 Amnesty International and CSRC have documented several recent incidents of forced evictions and attempted forced evictions by national park authorities,

including the case of Raj Kumar Chepang, who died after being beaten by army

officers in Chitwan National Park. 

The rights groups stated that laws should be amended to restrict detentions and the use of force by the army in protected areas. “Nepal’s authorities must recognize indigenous peoples’ rights to their ancestral lands and allow them to return” said CSRC executive director Jagat Basnet.