Nepal's King Gyanendra, in his first address to the military since he seized power, on Monday urged the security forces to crush a long-running revolt by Maoist rebels, accusing the militants of "terrorism". Gyanendra fired the government in February, detained political leaders and suspended civil liberties under a state of emergency. He said the move was necessary to crush the revolt in which more than 11,000 people have died and crippled the economy.
"The law and order situation of the country is passing through a difficult situation due to terrorism," Gyanendra told army officers in a rare address to a military academy on the outskirts of Kathmandu.
"The army has to fulfil its responsibility towards the people and the motherland," by crushing the revolt, the king said in Nepali on the third day of an 11-day strike called by the Maoists to protest against Gyanendra's February 1 seizure of power.
The guerrillas set off a bomb in a tourist town killing a student, as the strike pushed up prices of foodstuffs, officials and traders said.
The bomb exploded late on Sunday in Pokhara in western Nepal, where the strike call had been largely ignored.
Three people were also wounded in the explosion and the town, surrounded by the snow-capped Himalayas, shut down after the attack.
"It is completely closed after the blasts. It is quiet but tense," Jay Lal Lamsal, who works for a private company in Pokhara, told Reuters by phone.
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