By Biswajyoti Das
Chaimale, Nepal - Maoist guerrillas have abducted at least 50 students and a dozen teachers from a school near the Nepali capital to try to force them to back a campaign against the constitutional monarchy, officials said on Monday.
The rebels dragged the children, aged between 13 and 16, and their teachers at gunpoint from the school in Chaimale village on Sunday afternoon, police officer Deepak Ranjit said.
In the past the Maoists have kidnapped school and university students from the countryside, but have sent them back after one or two days of indoctrination, analysts said.
'They dragged my child in front of my eyes' Villagers in hilly Chaimale, south of Kathmandu, said about nine heavily armed guerrillas entered the two-storey school building and took away students and teachers. Most of the kidnapped students were girls.
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"They dragged my child in front of my eyes and I couldn't do anything to stop them. He was crying to be rescued," said Arjun Acharya, father of one of the kidnapped children.
Sunday's kidnapping of school children was the first in the Kathmandu Valley.
Soldiers have been deployed to secure the release of the hostages, Ranjit said.
The guerrillas have heavily mined the mountainous road leading to Chaimale and its surrounding areas, making it difficult for the troops to advance and intensify their search operations.
'He was crying to be rescued' In the past the guerrillas, seeking to set up a communist republic in one of the world's poorest countries, have ordered village families to send one child each to join their armed struggle.
Nepali authorities estimate that about 200 child soldiers are in the Maoist ranks fighting government forces.
The rebels, who control vast swathes of the countryside, have been striking government installations in Kathmandu in recent months to show their strength.
Nepal's minister for communication and official spokesperson, Mohammad Moushin, said the government had no information on the fate of the abducted children.
"It is a very serious matter. We need to somehow stop such incidents in future of school children being taken away and turned into combatants by Maoists," Moushin said.
Peace talks between government and rebels have failed twice. More than 10 000 people have been killed since the rebellion broke out in 1996.
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