Word: nepal
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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There might seem few places less likely to be scorched by the aftermath of Sept. 11, 2001, than Nepal. Outside Kathmandu, the Himalayan kingdom exists in a timeless trance of mountains and road-free valleys all but lost to the present day. True, the country faces a very serious internal-security threat?a Maoist rebellion?but even that menace underscores the fact that Nepal is fighting the battles of the last century...
...abducted in July were released by their captors last week after a ransom of $500,000 was paid by their employer, the Kuwait and Gulf Link Transport Company. But a group calling itself the Army of Ansar al-Sunna announced last week that it had executed 12 hostages from Nepal abducted in August, accusing the country's leadership of assisting U.S. forces in Iraq. But French journalists had been largely spared. "The few times French journalists were [apprehended], they always released us because we are French," says Sammy Ketz, Baghdad bureau chief for Agence France-Presse. The French government tried...
...India that pioneered the use of sanctuaries to save big cats. In 1973, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi became the toast of the conservation community when she launched Project Tiger, setting aside nine wilderness areas for tigers. Now India, with its neighbor Nepal, is leading the way in the next big phase in cat conservation: building links to turn isolated preserves into one continuous habitat. Scientists call this approach landscape conservation, and many believe it's the best hope for saving the world's tiger population, which, despite decades of effort, remains in peril: only 5,000 to 7,000 animals...
Some 200 of these massive cats live in the grasslands and forests along the India-Nepal border at the foot of the Himalayas. The area used to be sparsely populated, but after malaria was eradicated in the 1950s, farmers and loggers moved in. Today it is South Asia's Rice Bowl: there are 3.6 million people, vast paddies and 3.3 million head of livestock in the 19,000-sq.-mi. area. As land was cleared, tiger turf disappeared. Because the animals won't cross what they consider hostile terrain, they became separated into three isolated populations...
...program has been a success in southern Nepal's Bagmara Forest, where the WWF and the King Mahendra Trust for Nature Conservation helped local people set up a tree nursery. Tigers returned to the area, and locals are able to harvest timber, fuel wood and grasses according to a strict management plan. Local people also benefit directly from the return of wildlife. They collected about $73,000 last year from tourists who came to see tigers, elephants and rhinos in their forest...