KATHMANDU (Reuters) - The U.N. human rights agency has pressed Nepal for action against perpetrators of "arbitrary detention, torture and disappearances" during the deadly civil war that ended in 2006.
A decade-long Maoist rebellion that started in 1996 caused more than 13,000 deaths and displaced thousands, while the fate of hundreds of others who went missing is still unknown three years after peace with the former rebels.
Human rights groups have accused both the military and the Maoists of abuses during the war.
In two separate reports released in 2006 and 2008, the U.N. human rights office in Nepal had said 219 people had disappeared from just two places - Bardiya district in southwest Nepal and the Maharajgunj army barracks in Kathmandu.
The reports blamed 14 of these disappearances on the Maoists and the rest on the military.
"No action has been taken to properly investigate these human rights violations," the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) in Nepal said in a statement late on Sunday.
The OHCHR expressed "particular concern" about recent nominations for extension or promotion of senior army personnel in the chain-of-command at the time that violations took place.
Rewarding personnel against whom "there are credible allegations of involvement in human rights violations... will undermine any genuine efforts of the government to address impunity", said Richard Bennett, OHCHR-Nepal chief.
Government officials could not immediately be reached for comment.
The Maoist former rebels emerged as the largest political party in last year's election for a special constituent assembly after their 2006 ceasefire, but in May they quit in a conflict with the president who reversed their decision to sack the national army chief.
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