Did the King of Nepal purchase the services of this British firm for his February 1st shenanigans?

Something that made me think . . . as I was listening to a podcast of this article.

oohi
ashu
*************

"Strategic Communication Laboratories, a small U.K. firm specializing in "influence operations" made a very public debut this week with a glitzy exhibit occupying prime real estate at Defense Systems & Equipment International, or DSEi, the United Kingdom's largest showcase for military technology. The main attraction was a full-scale mock-up of its ops center, running simulations ranging from natural disasters to political coups"


AMONG the company's selling points:


"In another doomsday scenario, the company assists a newly democratic country in South Asia as it struggles with corrupt politicians and a rising insurgency that threatens to bubble over into bloody revolution. SCL steps in to assist the benevolent king of "Manpurea" to temporarily seize power.

"Oh, wait, that sounds a lot like Nepal, where the monarchy earlier this year ousted a corrupt government to stave off a rising Maoist movement. The problem is, the SCL scenario also sounds a lot like using a private company to help overthrow a democratically elected government. Another problem, at least in Nepal, is that the king now shows few signs of returning to democracy."

Read all about the rise of this private-sector company, and wonder about its role in Nepali politics.

Sept 19-20, 2005

Text version
- http://www.slate.com/id/2126479/

Podcast version
- http://media2.washingtonpost.com/media/slate/Podcasts/Slate_05092001.mp3

Ashu,
It was informative.. Thank you for sharing.
Shiv

yeah.... this is a good stuff!!! keep it up. You are on the right track now.

Sounds more like a new script to the Bolywood movie, yeah with extra spice added by the rain dances, tunes of love songs from the prince and his lover, frustrations, conspiricy, betrayal, killings.
Read another article on the mock kidnaping for thrills at a price, people are exploring new dimension of innovations.
If, there is even a slight possibility of the garnd design (as Girija babu always rants), involving such high tech conspiricy, and if the words of the king turns out true, I see a bright future for Nepal.

This looks like something worth investigating... see what sajha collectively can find.
Can people in the UK work on it more?

King G's recent walk-about in Patan had all the hallmarks of a well-orchestrated PR campaign.

A friend from Kathmandu had this to write in an email:

START QUOTE I know the detractors of the monarch will say that it was all staged and paid for. I will not deny that, but I also know that all political events are staged wheter it be the Republican party or the Democrats in the US, or an event organized in Lukhnow for Mr Rahul Gandhi. It is the party machinery that goes to work to make it happen. In front of the King was a political operator who watched the crowd to make sure that a kid being carried on a father's shoulders would get to sit in the front so that a photo op could be possible END OF QUOTE

Obviously, whether you love him or hate him, King G is getting some really interesting
PR advice.

Don't know from where.
Certainly not from our fellow Nepalis; that much is sure.

Could be from the sleek, media-savvy operatives from this particular British firm . . .
in fact one of this firm's declared achievements is:

"Design[ed] and develop[ed] a permanent military strategic communication facility capable of delivering strategic and operational psyop campaigns for a South Asian country."

Another one is:

"Design, build and install a Homeland Security Centre for an Asian country. The Opcentre can override all national radio and TV broadcasts in time of crisis."

Could the coluntry in question be our dear old maatri.bhoomi?
Once can't help but wonder.

Source?
The company's home page at

- http://www.scl.cc/projects.php

It's getting creepier by day.

oohi
ashu

Very interesting Ashu. How did you find out about this?
I think it's worhty of news in Nepalese newspapers. Why don't you use your contacts at Kantipur and get them to investigate further? The company does say that they won't give details of specific projects due to confidentiality issues. May be Kantipur can do some clever undercover work. In the mean time, I'm going to give these guys a call and ask which country they are referring to, and also let them know how much the public is suffering due to their action of overriding Nepal's communication system in the name of providing security to the king whenever they feel like it.

Kick wrote:

"How did you find out about this?"

Slate.com is a pretty standard mainstream American media outlet.
Any other Sajha visitor could have found out about it.
Just happened to be me, in this case. That's all.


"Why don't you use your contacts at Kantipur and get them to investigate further?"


No.

That's because I am neither a journalist nor an employee of Kantipur Publications to
tell Kantipur what to do and how to do it.

If members of the Nepali media visit Sajha, and find this interesting enough, maybe they'll try to find out more on their own and do their reports.

My limited participatory role here is to SHARE -- in a spirit of public service --
interesting AND verifiably traceable information about Nepal on Sajha, and let
visitors decide what they want to decide based on the available evidence. I know
my limitations, and I am happy doing just that.

oohi
ashu

Good job Ashu, with these type of postings you talk sense!!!

In fact, on that morning when King Gyane was about to talk a walk in Lalitpur, the mobiles were down!!!!!!!!!!!!!