WB postpones Nepal aid package after failure in reform
AFP, Kathmandu
A proposed 70 million-dollar World Bank aid package to Nepal has been postponed because the country failed to meet economic reform targets for the money, the bank said Tuesday. But the aid suspension had nothing to do with King Gyandendra's February 1 decision to sack the government and suspend civil rights to tackle a Maoist insurgency, said Rajib Upadhyay, World Bank spokesman in Kathmandu. The money was for funding poverty reduction programs in the current financial year starting July 2004 if the country reformed governance and labor laws and cut subsidies for petroleum products. But the World Bank confirmed a report in the Kathmandu Post this week that the bank had dealt a blow to the country's new regime by suspending the budgetary support. "It is true is that proposed second poverty reduction support credit has been postponed, but this decision is not related to the political situation," Upadhyay said in a e-mailed response to a query. "Instead, the decision to postpone the operation is related to the slow progress in the implementation of the reform agenda. The agreed reform actions... have not been completed, and therefore further processing will be delayed," he added.
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