How are Bhutans ties with Nepal, especially in the context of the question of Bhutanese of Nepalese origin?
Immigration into Bhutan started at the end of the last century. Those who came were basically farmers and were regularised in 1958. But the majority of the illegal immigrants entered Bhutan after we started the process of socio-economic development in 1961, when we launched our first five-year plan. As we started to develop the infrastructure of a modern state—roads, telecommunications, hospitals and so on—we needed a lot of labour and Nepalese labour was easily available and very cheap. Unfortunately, many of them decided to settle down in Bhutan and that is the genesis of the present problem. Nepal Foreign Minister P.C. Lohani has said that the country will internationalise the issue. We are committed to the bilateral process, we are convinced that given the necessary goodwill and political will, the problem can be resolved bilaterally. It is not an intractable problem. If the Nepalese government wishes to exercise some other option, it is their sovereign right to do so. But I think
