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Mayoral candidate shot in Nepal, rebels suspected+
(Japan Economic Newswire Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge)KATHMANDU, Jan. 30_(Kyodo) _ In the first attack after candidates filed their nominations to contest seats in Nepal's Feb. 8 municipal elections, gunmen shot and injured a candidate for the post of mayor of Lalitpur City on Monday afternoon, police said.
Two men riding on a motorcycle shot at Dal Bahadur Rai in the back around 2 p.m. while he was sitting on the veranda of his residence in the city, adjoining Kathmandu, according to police.
Police suspect Maoist insurgents were behind the attack, as the rebels have vowed to disrupt the municipal elections and have called a nationwide general strike starting Feb. 4.
The Maoists shot dead a prospective mayoral candidate before he filed his nomination papers in the eastern town of Janakpur on Jan. 22.
Nepal's main political parties are also boycotting the elections on grounds that they are meant to legitimize King Gyanendra's undemocratic rule.
The king fired a multiparty government and seized executive powers one year ago, ostensibly to battle the raging communist insurgency in the Himalayan kingdom.
Nepal's present monarch-led government says the municipal elections are being held to reenergize democracy in accordance with the king's road map for restoring multiparty democracy in three years from Feb. 1, 2005.
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