Politics
Dahal’s faux pas in Japan on meeting slain Japanese prime minister Abe in Nepal
The Maoist chair corrects himself hours later, saying he had held talks through different channels in the past with Abe, who never visited Nepal.Post Report
CPN (Maoist Centre) chair and former prime minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal made a faux pas in Japan on Saturday on his meetings with slain former prime minister Shinzo Abe in Nepal, only to correct himself hours later.
After arriving in Japan on Saturday, Dahal said when former Japanese prime minister Abe visited Nepal, he had had a conversation two-three times.
“I was trying to arrange a time to meet former prime minister Abe when I was scheduled to come to Japan,” said Dahal while speaking with journalists at the Narita airport. “I had a good talk with him when he visited Nepal. We had a very good interaction.”
Abe, who died on July 8 after being shot by a gunman, however, never visited Nepal.
He was 67.
Abe, who was prime minister from September 26, 2006 to September 26, 2007 and December 26, 2012 to September 16, 2020, is the longest serving prime minister of Japan.
Later in the day, while inaugurating the Nepal Festival 2022 Fukuoka, Japan, Dahal corrected himself, saying he was in contact and had conversation with Abe through different channels.
“The decision to visit Japan was made some one and a half months ago,” said Dahal while addressing the Nepali diaspora. “At that time, I was in contact and in conversation with Abe in various ways. I had conveyed my desire to meet with him through the Japanese embassy. But he had a very unfortunate death.”
Dahal arrived in Japan on Friday on a five-day visit.
According to the Embassy of Japan in Kathmandu, the only sitting prime minister to visit Nepal is Yoshiro Mori who arrived in Nepal in August 2000, marking the first official visit by a Japanese premier.
Nepali politicians are often criticised for making unsubstantiated claims and having a loose tongue.
Some social media users on Saturday were quick to react to Dahal’s claims about his meetings with Abe in Nepal. Some dubbed him a duplicitous politician.
The duplicity of the Maoist leader, who led the decade-long bloody war, was widely reported earlier in February this year when his denial of writing a letter to the US over Millennium Challenge Corporation was exposed.