This study aims to understand the needs of families of the Missing in Nepal as they themselves perceive them some 2 years after the end of armed conflict. The sampling frame used for this study is a list drawn up by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) of 1,227 persons missing as a result of the conflict (ICRC, 2008), compiled during ICRC‟s presence in Nepal since 1998, through visits to rural communities and from statements made by families who visited ICRC‟s offices. A selection of 10 of Nepal‟s 75 districts was made that enabled the worst affected districts to be included, whilst also ensuring a spread by region, geography (plains, hills, mountains), ethnicity and alleged perpetrator (state, Maoist).28 These 10 districts account for 43% of those on the ICRC list. Within these districts a random selection was made, and families visited in their homes.
Eighty-six families were interviewed, the vast majority with the family as a unit. Younger wives of the Missing were met alone or in peer groups so as to understand potentially problematic gender dynamics within families and communities. Interviews typically lasted around 90 minutes and were semi-structured, based on a 7 page script
28
The 10 districts visited were: Banke, Bardiya, Bhaktapur, Dhading, Dhanusa, Gorkha, Kathmandu, Lalitpur, Rolpa and Siraha.
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that had been developed in conjunction with family associations over a 2 month period prior to the research (Appendix I). Families were invited to prioritise needs relating to the disappearance through a series of open questions, and then probed about specific elements of those needs. Additionally, 10 focus groups containing a total of 74 relatives of the Missing were conducted with peer groups selected by family associations; these included groups of wives of the Missing, members of particular ethnic groups, and groups defined by the perpetrator of disappearance. The research was conducted over a six month period two years after the end of the conflict in a period (April - September 2008) when a Maoist led Government was in office. Disappearances discussed here took place between two and twelve years prior to the study, and on average five years before (see Figure 4).
A minority of the Missing are educated and urban (a significant number of students are among those missing) but most come from rural peasant backgrounds. As a result, many families of the Missing are of low educational level, illiterate and poor. The Missing are predominantly younger males (see Table 3 and Figure 8) with the result that families have been deprived of breadwinners and women of husbands, often with young children to support, reducing economic security. The janajati, peoples considered indigenous to Nepal, were successfully mobilised by the Maoists and thus became more vulnerable to becoming casualties of the conflict. The janajati of both the hills and Terai are among the most excluded and poorest of the people of Nepal and the conflict reduced further their ability to cope both as communities and as individual victims of the conflict. In the Terai, the Tharu (see Section 4.2) were victimised by the forces of the state to the extent that in Bardiya district they constitute approximately 80% of those Missing (CVC, 2007), despite barely being a majority in the district. In the central and eastern Terai the Madeshi population29 constitutes a majority of the Missing. As a result of the ethnic and gender composition of the Missing, the typical interviewee is a rural woman of low educational level from an indigenous ethnic group.
The sampling used in this study, and described above, aims to be representative of all families of the Missing. Here, the profile of those interviewed is described. The tables below show a breakdown of the sample in terms of ethnicity of the missing person, gender, status (civilian, combatant etc.), religion, the year they went missing,
29
The Madeshi are persons considered to be of recent Indian origin, living largely in the Terai, who constitute about 35% of Nepal‟s population (Sinha, 2009).
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perpetrator and the relationship of the principal interviewee to the missing person. The ethnic profile shows the high number of janajati and Madeshis, as well as a significant number of higher castes, largely senior CPN-M cadres and students taken from Kathmandu (Table 1).
Table 1 Ethnic and caste composition of the families met for the study.
The perpetrators responsible for the person becoming Missing are shown in Table 2. The two cases where the perpetrator is unknown consist of one where a young man working away from home disappeared in a zone of conflict and one where a man was abducted by individuals known to have worked with both the CPN-M and the security forces.
male female
Missing person 79 7
Principal
interviewee 33 53
Table 3 Gender of the missing person and the principal interviewee.
Ethnic group Number
Hindu high castes [Brahmin
/ Chhetri] 21
Dalit 7
Plains indigenous [Tharu] 28
Madeshi Hindu 12 Muslim 2 Hill indigenous [Magar, Chepang, Tamang, Gurung] 16 Perpetrator Number State 71 CPN-M 13 Perpetrator unknown 2
Table 2 Perpetrators responsible for the person being Missing.
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The age distribution of the Missing peaks for those aged 15 – 30 years (Figure 8). Given that the vast majority of the Missing are male (Table 3), this has the effect of depriving families of those who are at their most economically valuable, resulting in often
extreme challenges to livelihood. Most of these young men were married (86% of all the Missing were married), and many had fathered children who were young at the time of disappearance. Nine of the Missing are under 18 years of age, more than 10% of the sample, largely teenagers taken by the security forces.
The status of the missing person, notably in relation to the parties to the conflict, is subject to some uncertainty and that presented here is based on what was reported by the family (Table 4). The family members of missing security force personnel included in this sample are those of a policeman taken by the CPN-M and an off-duty (Tharu) RNA soldier made missing by the RNA in Bardiya.
Civilian 53
Security forces 2 CPN-M member or
supporter 25
PLA fighter 2
Table 4 Status of the missing person.
Wife 28 Brother / sister 17 Son / daughter 14 Mother 11 Husband 3 Other 4
Table 5 The relationship of the principal interviewee to the missing person.
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 10-14 15-19 20-24 25-29 30-34 35-39 40-44 45-49 50-54 55-59 60+ Numb er M iss in g
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The number of missing in each year of the conflict represents a history of the intensity of the conflict, Figure 9. The average time passed since the person went missing was more than 5 years at the time of field work.