My unvarnished impression of ICG reports is that: a) They are well-written. b) They make suggestions that everyone in Nepal politely ignores. If you go through the past few reports, it becomes clear that hardly any of ICG's recommendations have ever come to pass. This is partly, I would think, due to the fact that that ICG-Nepal is staffed by journalists and (left-wing) 'soft' social scientists (not that anything's wrong with either group!) and NOT by case-driven lawyers, poker-faced strategists and number-crunching economists who specialise, say, on the economics of conflicts. (OK, maybe that's just my bias creeping up here!) c) Among certain Nepali intellectuals, it's fashionable to start some sentences like this, "As the ICG report says . . ." or "As I read in the ICG report . . ." They then say whatever it is that they want to say, whether that's in the report or not. Alternatively, if you want to be taken seriously in Nepal, stroke your chin, look far into the horizon, and start your sentences by saying, "I was reading this ICG report last night, and what I found really interesting is that . . . " d) The reports are good as archived recent political history. e) Talking about incentives, ICG needs Nepal to be in a perpetual crisis. Why? Reporting about Nepal's crisis is one way how International Crisis Group (ICG) earns its keep. No crisis in Nepal, no ICG in nepal. [hemce, ICG could be an employer of choice to those Nepalis with degrees in 'conflict management.'] f) That said, all thinking Nepalis should welcome ICG reports as another additional data-points to understand what's going on in Nepal. oohi ashu