Kathmandu - Large parts of Kathmandu city centre shut down Sunday following clashes between police and protestors demonstrating a government decision not to finance traditional animal sacrifice.

Thousands of protestors, mostly from the Newar community - considered the original inhabitants of Kathmandu Valley - forced shops, educational institutions and main markets to shut down and prevented transport from operating in the Old City area.

Police said at least a dozen vehicles that defied the strike were vandalized by the demonstrators.

Kathmandu - At least 14 people were killed and dozens more missing after torrential monsoon rains in western Nepal triggered flash floods and landslides, official media reports said.

The government-owned Rising Nepal newspaper said most of the deaths were reported from four districts - Kailali, Kanchanpur, Doti and Gulmi.

In Doti district, about 450 kilometres west of the Nepalese capital Kathmandu, five people included a 7-month-old infant were killed when their house was struck by landslide. .

Kathmandu - At least five people were killed and another 15 missing after flash floods and landslides hit several districts in western Nepal, official reports said Saturday.

Government-owned Nepal Television said at least six districts in western Nepal had been hit by heavy rains since Friday night causing landslides in several mountainous areas and flooding farmland and villages in the plains.

It said at least four people were killed when their houses were buried by landslides in Gulmi and Kalikot districts, about 300 kilometres west of the capital Kathmandu.

Kathmandu - Nepalese Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal Saturday
left for New York to take part in the United Nations General Assembly.

The visit is his third foreign trip since he became the prime minister just over a month ago.

Dahal, a former rebel leader popularly known as Prachanda, will
address the UN General Assembly on Friday and is expected to attend the
banquet host by US President George W Bush in New York.

Speaking briefly to reporters, Dahal said he would put Nepal's views during his speech at the UN.

Kathmandu, Sept 20 : Nepal Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal alias ''Prachanda'' will leave for the United States today where he will address the UN General Assembly in New York. 

"I am leaving for the US visit where I will address the UN General Assembly. I have also just received an invitation to attend a reception to be hosted there by the US president George Bush," said Prachanda in his address to the Constituent Assembly last night.

Mumbai, Sept. 20 : At least 500 Nepalese children have been sold into slavery to Indian circuses over the past year, according to a new report issued in Kathmandu.

The Times quotes the Nepali Central Child Welfare Board report as saying that India is emerging as a major hub for human trafficking.

The paper further goes on to say that Indian circus owners prize young Nepalese girls for their fair skin and “exotic looks” – features also favoured by the pimps who run prostitution rackets that span South Asia and the Middle East.

Impoverished parents in Nepal are paid as little as 10 pounds for their daughters by agents usually linked to powerful organised crime networks, human rights activists claim.