Nepali troops were on high alert on Sunday after attacks around Kathmandu by Maoist rebels killed 12 policemen, an army officer said, according to Reuters. On Saturday, heavily-armed guerrillas stormed a police post at Thankot, 10 km (6 miles) from Kathmandu, tossed a bomb and sprayed bullets from automatic rifles, killing 11 policemen. In the second attack near the temple town of Bhaktapur, also close to Kathmandu, one policeman was killed and at least eight wounded. Other blasts around the city caused no injuries. The attacks were the first near the high-security capital, home to 1.5 million people, since Maoist rebels ended their truce on Jan. 2 after the government refused to match it. The upsurge in violence follows four months of relative calm and comes as King Gyanendra, who dismissed the government and took power last year, prepares to hold civic polls next month which have been opposed by the Maoists and political parties. At Thankot, witnesses said dozens of rebels in plain clothes arrived in a bus followed by armed guerrillas in another bus. They swiftly carried out the raid and escaped in nearby forests. Unexploded bombs, and bullets left after the raid littered the police post on a highway linking the hill-ringed capital with the southern plains.
