Prachanda wants to visit Mao’s village

Nepal’s Maoist chief Prachanda says would visit China soon and draw inspiration from Mao Zedong’s hometown Shaoshan in Hunan province, reports Anirban Roy.

Nepal’s Maoist chief Prachanda has said he would visit China soon and draw inspiration from Mao Zedong’s hometown Shaoshan in Hunan province.

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While Prachanda talks about maintaining equal distance from India and China, the Maoist leader told the China Daily he is eager to visit China soon.

“When our communications minister (Krishna Bahadur Mahara) was in China recently, he was instructed to prepare for my visit. I hope I will soon be in Beijing,” he said. This would be the Maoist chief’s first visit to China. After coming over ground in June 2006, he has been to India and Switzerland.

The firebrand communist leader, who surprised the world with the victory of his party in the Constituent Assembly election, said he wanted to visit the “great helmsman” Chairman Mao’s village.

He said the new government would take strong measures against anti-China activities in Nepal. Over the past few weeks, Tibetan refugees have been regularly protesting in front of the Chinese embassy in Kathmandu.

“When we lead the government, we will change the situation,” Prachanda said, adding the new government would talk to India to end infiltration of Tibetan refugees to Kathmandu from Dharmasala. “We will not tolerate anti-China activities on our soil and we will take strong administrative measures to control these activities,” he said.