International Sources

Nepal sends Bhutanese refugees to third country for resettlement - Earthtimes
Kathmandu - More than 420 Bhutanese refugees living in UN-run camps in eastern Nepal have been resettled in another country as part of a third-country resettlement programme, media report said Sunday. A total of 422 refugees were sent to the United …

Tigers in Snow Leopard Land - Environment News Service
THIMPHU, Bhutan , May 9, 2008 (ENS) - Fresh pictures and pugmarks from the Jigme Dorji National Park show that royal Bengal tigers in Bhutan are being found at altitudes never seen before. In fact, authorities say that the tigers are going so high …

From the Druk Gyalpo to the people - Kuensel Online
10 May, 2008 - Bhutan’s deeply revered Monarchy handed over the reigns of governance to the people on May 8, the third day of the fourth month. The people of Bhutan watched in emotional silence as His Majesty the King Jigme Khesar Namgyal Wangchuck …

Save Write to Editor - Times of India
NEW DELHI: When Prime Minister Manmohan Singh goes to Bhutan next week, his main activity will be to start off power projects. It’s part of an important strategy for regional diplomacy - after connectivity, electricity is becoming a vital instrument …

Global tourism struggles to cut it’s environmental footprint - Morning Call
Citing green hotels, coconut oil fuel for airlines and even recyclable golf tees, executives in one of the world’s largest industries say they are urgently trying to shrink tourism’s oversized environmental footprint. But with global travel projected …

THT Online - Himalayan Times
The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) has resettled 422 Bhutanese refugees to third countries so far. IOM has informed Nepali security officials that it has resettled 422 refugees to different countries including the US, a source said …

To debate or not to? - Kuensel Online
10 May, 2008 - As Bhutan’s first parliamentary session got down to business, the first debate was on the draft Constitution. The focus was not on content but on the debate itself, and the parliament decided to discuss the draft, more to understand …

Extinct” pygmy hog being reinducted in Assam forest - Webindia 123
The Pygmy Hog, the world’s smallest pig and one of the most endangered species of the planet, is successfully being bred in captivity and reinducted into a forest in Assam, after being declared ”extinct” in the 1960s. After 12 years of a mammoth …

Assam Government Launches Probe Into Rhino Poaching - The Epoch Times
GUWAHATI, India—In response to intense public pressure, the state government of Assam in northeast India has approved a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the killing of over 30 rhinos by poachers in Assam since January 2007, the …

Endangered pygmy hogs released into wild - Daily Telegraph
Numbers of a critically endangered species of wild pig are to be boosted following the success of a captive breeding programme. Three small families of the pygmy hog will be released back into wild grasslands in Assam in north east India. The 16 …

Kuensel - Bhutan’s National Newspaper

His Majesty’s address at the first session of parliament

10 May, 2008 - It is with deep personal satisfaction and happiness that I address this inaugural session of Parliament. After all, it is in a time of unprecedented peace and prosperity that we are gathered today to celebrate our nation’s historic achievement of a unique democratic transition.

From the Druk Gyalpo to the people

His Majesty the King being escorted to the Assembly hall

10 May, 2008 - Bhutan’s deeply revered Monarchy handed over the reigns of governance to the people on May 8, the third day of the fourth month.

The people of Bhutan watched in emotional silence as His Majesty the King Jigme Khesar Namgyal Wangchuck formally announced the transition at a historic joint sitting of parliament in Thimphu.

Workshop relocation – going, going, not yet gone

Waiting for blacktopped roads, drainage system and waste disposal site

8 May, 2008 - The infrastructure at Olarangchu, where Thimphu’s workshops are to be relocated, is not yet completed but that has not stopped the Thimphu city corporation from pressurising workshop owners to move or else …

Flash flood raises relocation issue

Leftover wreckage after nature’s fury

8 May, 2008 - A flash flood that hit Lhuentse town’s upper market on May 1, after a small stream burst its banks following a heavy downpour, washed away a temporary wooden toilet and inundated a hotel and a store.

Cordyceps collection liberalised

Cordyceps spores

8 May, 2008 - There will be more hands picking Yartsa Goenbub (Cordyceps sinesis) this summer with the agriculture ministry liberalising the number of people from each household to collect a prized source of income for Bhutanese highland farmers.

Good Samaritan killed in freak accident

The offending fallen water pipe

8 May, 2008 - A 16-year-old boy named Gyepo lost his life in a freak accident in Bondey on May 2 when strong winds dislocated an eighteen-foot water pipe that fatally punctured his head. The incident happened when he was carrying an injured friend to the doctor.

Bhutan Observer

Incommunicado: losing your tongue?
I’m the great pretender. I eat, walk and sleep Dzongkha, yet I take pride in saying, “I can only write in English”
Trying to presume the garb of the hypocritical attitude of, “I only know how to correspond
in English and am poor in Dzongkha,” sounds a bit absurd sometimes. In striving to be what we are […]

Type of rose in the college garden
Floods of tear washed away the dreams of hopes that glimmered YOUNGDREL’s face. The abrupt end of nurtured relation turned out to be fake and dream turns to be a dream like. Good grounds of expectation become worst of all.
On the third day presence of Youngdrel in the College he resigned loving one bountiful lady […]

“The change: old habits die hard”
Everything in life is impermanent except the Change. If we can cope with it then true and long lasting happiness can be enhanced both for the present and the future. Change can ravage anybody’s sanity if untamed. The change must come and it is unavoidable but as human beings, we can nurture it for our […]

Everyday is a winding road
The government has toiled hard in creating schools even in remote areas to provide easier access to education, leading to an increase the numbers of children going to school, however, a mode of transportation is something that has been sidelined.
Its 5 am, Phub Dema and her younger brother, Kezang, are up. After a quick wash […]

The old man and the mani: an old wheel still in spin
Observer’s Kunga T Dorji meets a man without possessions. All he has is a mani
It’s breakfast time at the Punakha Higher Secondary School in Lekithang. As the students file up in the dining hall for their servings of fried rice and tea, a lone figure in a shabbily worn sun-bleached gho limps […]

The story of the times
I was born in the boondocks – an obscure village that is. No nurse delivered me for the health unit was too distant. Besides, there was the chance that she may not have been there at the time.
There was a school I attended rather late in my adolescence. Early learning was not possible because my […]

HM opens first parliament
His Majesty the King yesterday graced the first session of parliament under the democratic constitutional monarchy. In age-old tradition, His Majesty was received and escorted in a chibdrel ceremony to the parliament where the members of the political parties offered kusung thukten mendrel, followed by the zhugdrel phuensum tshogpai ceremony. During these auspicious ceremonies, the […]

Of distant lands and dreary procedures
The local area plans within the Thimphu municipal boundary have been complete – not so with land demarcation. That makes land allocation a very distant dream.
The Thimphu municipal boundary was identified from Olarongchhu through Ngaberongchhu
in Chang and Mewang geogs and the structure plan approved in 2002. Work on local area plans started right after.
Since then, […]

MoH gears up to revamp health services
The DPT cabinet will establish a medical college within the next two years using the JDWNRH as the “teaching base.”
The shortage of medical professionals has resulted in doctors and nurses being overworked, thus hampering their professional services.
The Health Minister, Lyonpo Zangley Dukpa, said the only way to address the shortage of medical professionals was to […]

Public grievance cell
In one of its first actions after assuming office, the new government has established a public cell in the Lyonchen’s office.
This cell will provide direct access to the public to express their grievances relating to government policies, laws, rules, and regulations, public service delivery, governance and other matters.
It will also keep the government informed on […]

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