Kathmandu (AsiaNews) - Today the Maoists are in power in Nepal, former guerrilla leader Prachanda has been elected prime minister, and the country has modified its constitutional foundation, abandoning the monarchy and embracing the Republic. What has not changed is the fate of more than 1200 people, who are still officially classified as "disappeared", and whose families have not heard anything about them for years.

On the occasion of the International Day of Disappeared Persons, observed last August 30, the Nepalese Human Rights Commission issued a new appeal to the government and to the Maoists - who so far have listened only to what they want to hear - that reliable information be obtained on the fate of disappeared persons, and that a commission be created to determine who is responsible for their disappearance. The creation of this commission is part of the plan agreed to two years ago by the government and by the Maoists, at the time of the signing of peace agreements that put an end to the bloody war that erupted in 1996.

According to the human rights commission, the state is responsible for the "disappearance of 671 people", while the Maoists have still not provided any information about the fate of 299 people kidnapped during the years of guerrilla warfare. At the same time, officials for the international committee of the Red Cross have released the names of more than 1200 people whose families have reported their disappearance during the decade of 1996-2006.

One of the demonstrations organized for the International Day of Disappeared Persons united thousands of relatives outside the offices of the Nepalese National Human Rights Commission. AsiaNews took down the stories of two people who have still not been heard from by their families. "My 15-year-old daughter was dragged away by Maoists three years back", recounts Sindhu Rokaya, 65. "But we have not been informed whether she is alive or dead". This story is echoed by Hemraj Dangi, also from the western part of the country, who denounces the kidnapping of his son "while returning back from school. If he had a gun to fight with, we could understand him being captured, but he was simply an innocent school boy coming home after his studies".