PM Oli calls for Security Council meeting amid political crisis in Nepal

Nepal’s acting Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli has called for a Security Council meeting on Tuesday morning amid rising political uncertainty following his decision to dissolve the parliament last year.

Oli, who is also the Chairman of the Security Council, has summoned a meeting at 9:30 am at his official residence in Baluwatar where Foreign Minister Pradeep Gyawali, Finance Minister Bishnu Poudel, Home Minister Ram Bahadur Thapa and Chief of Army Staff Purna Chandra Thapa are expected to be present.

“It is a regular meeting which is always held after a certain interval of time,” Defense Secretary Reshmi Raj Pandey told ANI in a telephonic interaction.

There is a constitutional provision for the National Security Council to be chaired by the Prime Minister to formulate policies related to the overall national interest, security, and defense, and to recommend to the government for the mobilisation or control of the Nepal Army.

The last round of meetings was held on December 21 last year, a day after Oli dissolved the parliament calling for fresh elections, nearly two years before the schedule.

The latest round of meeting of Security Council meeting collides with the time when the Supreme Court is preparing to start delivering its verdict over a dozen cases challenging Oli’s move to dissolve the parliament.

(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

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