Patrick Leahy: “there are times in virtually every country's history when years of underdevelopment and conflict give rise to…”

“there are times in virtually every country's history when years of underdevelopment and conflict give rise to opportunities to change course. Such times are rare, and such opportunities are too often missed. I think of our Civil War, which caused so much loss of life and devastation. It preserved the Union, and it led to the emancipation of some 3 million African slaves. Nothing can diminish those achievements or the sacrifice of those who gave their lives. But instead of providing the former slaves with the equal rights to which they were entitled, until passage of the Civil Rights Act a century later African Americans suffered from racially discriminatory laws that kept them in an inferior status. The country remained bitterly divided because of it. Nepal today faces its own historic choice. For more than a decade, Nepal has been plagued by an internal armed conflict in which savage brutality was inflicted on impoverished civilians by Maoist insurgents and the Royal Nepal Army. Over 13,000 people died, mostly noncombatants, and virtually no one has been held accountable for those crimes. For more than two centuries, Nepal has been a monarchy whose Kings, with rare exception, denied the rights and ignored the needs of their people who remain among the world's poorest.”