The International Commission of Jurists has pointed to the legal hurdle for the transitional justice bodies to carry out their tasks of establishing truth and prosecuting perpetrators of insurgency-era crimes.

In a statement on Friday, the rights organisation stressed the need for amendments to the exiting transitional justice Act in line with the Supreme Court verdicts and Nepal’s international obligations in order to win the trust of the conflict victims as well as the international community.

The Nepal government extended the terms of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the Commission of Investigation on Enforced Disappeared Persons by one year on Thursday as the two-year mandates of the commissions came to an end.

Conflict victims and the rights defenders have also been demanding that the government amend the law and empower the commissions by providing them with expertise and logistics.

The TRC had made legal amendment as a precondition to extending the office term. It argues that the commission would not be able to work in the absence of a legal framework and logistics to investigate into more than 58,000 complaints received from conflict victims.

The CIEDP has also been demanding that the act of disappearance be criminalised. The commission, which has registered over 3,000 complaints related to disappearance, is set to start a detailed probe in a couple of weeks.

The commissions have been criticised for poor performance in the two-year period. Some blame the government for tightening the provision of resources for the commission.

“Unless the government of Nepal is prepared to amend the TRC Act in line with the Supreme Court’s rulings and international law and to take other concrete steps to address the persistent challenges that have plagued the commissions’ ability to complete their work over the past two years, the extension of their mandate will be meaningless,” said Sam Zarifi, the ICJ’s Asia-Pacific director.