Nepal government seizes private radio station's equipment

Nepali police raided a private radio station and seized its equipment for defying a ban on broadcasting from more than one place, officials said on Saturday.
The ban on airing programmes from more than one place is part of wider media curbs imposed by the government since King Gyanendra assumed power in February. The government has not given a reason for the broadcasting ban.
Two weeks ago, the government also banned criticism of the royal family, news bulletins on privately owned radio stations and imposed longer prison terms and larger fines on journalists for defamation. Hundreds protested on Friday against the curbs.
Binod Raj Gwyanli, chief of Kantipur FM radio station that broadcasts from two places, said security forces took away uplinking equipment from the station in downtown Kathmandu shortly before midnight on Friday.
The equipment was used to transmit radio programmes produced in Kathmandu to a relay station at Bhendetar in east Nepal.
"Now our programmes cannot be heard in more than 16 districts in east Nepal," Gwyanli told Reuters.
He said the two radio stations had been running for four years from two places with the government's permission.
But a government spokesman said the move was aimed at enforcing new legislation introduced two weeks ago which bars radio stations from broadcasting from two places.
"It is the responsibility of the government to enforce the law. And the action (against the radio) is a move towards that," Ratna Raj Pandey, a spokesman of the Information and Communications Ministry, told Reuters.
But several private radio stations are broadcasting news after appealing to the Supreme Court against the decision.
Criticism of King Gyanendra and independent reporting on the anti-monarchy Maoist revolt was banned since he took over on February 1, fired the government, detained political leaders and suspended civil rights.
The crackdown came hours after the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) in Nepal said the changes in media laws would limit freedom of expression.
The king said his move in the troubled Himalayan kingdom was needed to control a bloody Maoist revolt, which has killed more than 12,500 people since 1996.