KATHMANDU, Nepal, Jan. 10 (UPI) -- The U.N. envoy to Nepal urged parties involved in the peace process to reach consensus for monitoring arms and armed forces before the U.N. mission leaves.
"Even at this late date, I remain very hopeful that the parties will find the flexibility to resolve this issue," Karin Landgren, the U.N. secretary-general's representative to Nepal, said Monday during her final briefing before departing Kathmandu.
The mandate for the U.N. Mission of Nepal expires this week, the United Nations said in a release. The mission was established in 2007 after the government and Maoists reached a peace agreement ending a war in which 13,000 people died.
Last week, Landgren told the U.N. Security Council in New York that little progress was made on forming a new government, integrating 19,000 former rebels or drafting a new constitution.
"With the parties unable to make significant progress on the issue of integration and rehabilitation during several extensions of the mission's mandate, follow-on monitoring arrangements became necessary," she said Monday in Kathmandu.
Landgren said she was hopeful the parties will break the impasse over monitoring arms and armed forces.
"Throughout Nepal's peace process, the parties have shown that they are capable of putting aside their differences at the most critical times to forge last-minute consensus," she said.
