Sept. 15—Two days of extremely violent riots in Kathmandu, Nepal, last week. which saw protesters capture Singha Durbar, which housed the office of the former Prime Minister and other ministries, setting them on fire, as well as the residence for the Prime Minister, forcing his resignation. K.P. Sharma Oli resigned as prime minister Sept. 9, after his residence was burned with his wife inside; initialed reports said that she had burned to death, but later reporting said that she had survived with serious burns. During the two-day demonstrations, hundreds of protesters stormed the Prime Minister’s office, set fire to the Supreme Court and Parliament buildings, and vandalized and torched the homes of several other senior leaders.

Following a nearly four-hour virtual meeting in which between 300 and 400 participants of the protest movement took part, according to local media, the youth leaders of the protest movement proposed former Chief Justice Sushila Karki to serve as the country’s interim prime minister, Reuters reported Sept. 10. Sushila Karki, 73, the former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Nepal and the only woman to have held the post, has accepted the proposal.

The Ministry of Health and Population of Nepal stated Sept. 10 that the death toll has risen to 30; other reports have it as high as 100. According to the ministry, 1,033 people were injured during the nationwide protests. Nepal’s international airport has officially reopened after being closed for two days.

While news from Nepal is scarce and often contradictory, Western experts note that, as India and China move to re-establish relations, creating a crisis in Nepal serves as a target of destabilization for both. The BBC notes that Nepal shares a largely open border of more than 1,000 miles with five Indian states: Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Sikkim, Bihar, and West Bengal. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi swiftly reacted to the unfolding events: “The violence in Nepal is heart-rending. I am anguished that many young people have lost their lives,” Modi wrote in a post on X on Sept. 9. He chaired also an emergency security meeting with his cabinet.

BBC writes: “The unrest also has implications for the large Nepalese diaspora in India. An estimated 3.5 million Nepalis work or live in India, but experts say the actual number could be much higher. Nepal is predominantly a Hindu-majority country and communities across the border have close family ties. People travel between the two countries without a visa or passport.”

Giving only a hint at likely British intentions, BBC states: “Given the Himalayan nation’s strategic location, both India and China are vying for influence in the country, leading to accusations that the two Asian giants are meddling in the internal affairs of Nepal.”