By STEVE ARGUE

Nepal is one of the poorest countries in the world with an average yearly income $220 dollars a year and an estimated 40% of the people living below the poverty level. It is also the home of a popular socialist (Maoist) uprising that controls one quarter of the countryside. In those areas controlled by revolutionaries tremendous advances have been made in education, clean drinking water, women's rights, and land reform.

In November King Gyanendra ordered a state of emergency and suspended the Nepalese constitution. This was an official suspension of many rights that already were often violated. With the King's declaration he suspended the right to peaceful assembly, freedom of movement, freedom of press, the right to privacy, and freedom from preventative detention.

Thirty Nepalese journalists are currently being held without charge and another seventy were previously arrested under the measures of the state of emergency. Obviously King Gyanendra fears the press's scrutiny of his actions.