Everybody who reads the newspapers in Nepal knows the story of Dekendra Thapa of Dailekh. He was a journalist, well known in his district, and the media reported extensively on his killing by Maoist rebels in 2004. By the time his case was brought before the Dailekh District Court in January 2013, it had become a cause célèbre, representative of Maoist excesses and attacks on non-combatants during the war. The case continues to have emblematic value: It is one of the very few cases of conflict-era human rights violations that have been tried so far, and the only one in which the guilty fully served out their sentences. What then can we learn from the trial? Listen to a Podcast from the Record :
