Five killed as police fire at protesters in Nepal

Violence in Nepal continued unabated today as five more people were today killed and several others injured when police opened fire at ethnic Madhesi group protesters agitating against the proposed new Constitution in two separate towns bordering India.
Police fired at demonstrators from the Madhesi ethnic minority after they vandalised a police post and a revenue office and set on fire government vehicles, defying curfew clamped in Parsa district's Birgunj municipality which borders Raxaul town in Bihar.
Four protestors were killed and several others were injured in the clash, Home Ministry spokesperson Laxmi Prasad Dhakal said.
In another incident, a 22-year-old protester died during a clash with police in Kalaiya town of Bara district.

Curfew has been imposed in some districts of southern Nepal as the protests against proposed new Constitution turned violent which claimed 11 lives last week, prompting authorities to deploy army in the riot-hit districts.
The Joint Madhesi Front has enforced an indefinite strike in Parsa and neighbouring districts in southern Nepal to protest the draft constitution and seven-province federal model proposed by the major parties on August 15.

The Madhesi parties are demanding autonomous region in the Terai, the southern plains and more rights and representation for the Madhesi people living in the southern Nepal.
The ethnic groups say having a separate state would give them a stronger say in local affairs.

The new draft national Constitution presented in the Constituent Assembly, the national parliament, aims to restructure Nepal as a federal state made up of seven provinces.
The main political parties now agree that there should be seven federal states, but smaller political parties and ethnic groups oppose either the number or the structure of the states.