Kathmandu, Oct 10: The government has withdrawn security personnel assigned beyond the approved standard for CPN-UML Chair KP Sharma Oli and CPN (Maoist Centre) Chair Pushpa Kamal Dahal Prachanda, citing noncompliance with security guidelines.

A meeting of the Central Security Committee at the Home Ministry on Thursday decided to recall all security personnel deployed in excess of the approved standard or assigned without qualification. Following the decision, the extra security personnel attached to Oli and Dahal were withdrawn.

According to the Home Ministry, 28 personnel from Oli’s security detail and 34 from Dahal’s have been recalled. Ministry spokesperson Anand Kafle said all current and former VIPs with more security than the prescribed standard will have their excess personnel withdrawn.

Kafle added that exact figures on how many security personnel will be recalled from each individual will be available by Friday. With this decision, current and former high-profile figures will be allowed to keep only the number of security personnel specified by government standards.

People’s News Monitoring Service