Kathmandu, Feb 6 : Nepal's army said it would go after the Maoist insurgents in full force, pressuring them to resume peace negotiations with the new government or face the consequences. The army's mandate is to "disarm the Maoists and bring them to the mainstream", said Brigadier-General Dipak Gurung, Royal Nepalese Army spokesman. "If they don't do it willingly, we have to do it by force," Gurung told IANS. The Royal Nepalese Army, constitutionally under the control of a security council consisting of the prime minister, defence minister and army chief, had its curbs removed Tuesday when King Gyanendra dismissed the government of prime minister Sher Bahadur Deuba and imposed a state of emergency. "Our resources were diverted. But now with the civil administration and police dealing with the political parties and student unions, we will be more focused," Gurung said. "Earlier, the army used to get diverted from its mandate due to being called to combat rallies, shutdowns, demonstrations and other forms of agitation," he said. The army plans to mount pressure on the underground rebels. The Deuba government had approved the recruitment of an additional 7,000 soldiers whose training has already been started. Besides increasing the strength of the army, its headquarters have been decentralised into five divisions, each unit mounting its own operations in each of the five development regions of Nepal independently and one more for Kathmandu valley. The RNA has also started setting up bases in the remote districts where earlier it had no presence and plans to expand them still more. Gurung said the army had drawn the sting of the communist guerrillas by shutting down communications countrywide. "There have been no attacks by the Maoists since Tuesday," he said. "They can't plan operations now since they have no means of communication." The spokesman blamed the media for the fear psychosis created by the underground guerrillas. "An insignificant publication somewhere would say there's a shutdown called by the rebels and everyone would close in fear," he said. "We can survive without Maoist news. Maybe the media was misguided or was not mature enough. In the past 15 years, there was a lot of press freedom. But what did it achieve? Our ultimate end is a peaceful and prosperous Nepal." Gurung denied that the army had been violating human rights to crack down on the nine-year-old insurgency. "Immediately after the royal proclamation, army chief Gen Pyar Jung Thapa issued directives to the troops to respect human rights," he said. "It was no mere lip service. An army can't tolerate indiscipline. We treat human rights violations by soldiers as cases of indiscipline and take action. These are propaganda spread by the Maoists." As an example of punitive action, Gurung said a major found guilty of breach of discipline was dismissed from the army and sentenced to two years in prison. Gurung also said India and the US should support Nepal. Both countries have expressed grave concern at the royal takeover and urged for the immediate restoration of multi-party democracy. India also pulled out of the 13th SAARC Summit that was to have been held in Bangladesh on Feb 6-7, citing the development in Nepal and security situation in Bangladesh as the reasons. "Countries like India and the US should support us because we are fighting against terrorism," he said. "It brought us to the brink of disaster with the country's sovereignty being in question. Terrorism is not just Nepal's concern, it's going to affect all of South Asia. We should all fight it together."