Ashu, You -- despite your high credentials of being a well-educated and an articulate person -- do not seem to cease to amaze me with your occasional pettiness. "Then again, OF COURSE, Rhoderick Chalmers has to strain to say such appeasing things about the Maoists. Why? Because without them, there will be no further crisis, and, with no further crisis, Rhoddy will be out of a job in Nepal. This is downright personal and unwarranted accusation on Rhoderick based on your baseless assumption. Maybe you are right, but then again maybe you are not. However, to put forth such unfounded accusation to support your argument is nothing but being petty and unprofessional. I, for one, would believe that in today's world full of conflicts, Rhoderick would have absolutely no problems accquiring another assignment with the ICG should Nepal become peaceful and there would be no need of ICG projects in Nepal. "If this is NOT spineless, self-serving play on words from someone whose PhD is in some study of languages, what is?" Again, this is such an unsubstantive (in terms of it being a REAL argument) personal attack on the writer that it'd prompt me to question your own ability to argue with reason and some degree of intellect. That said, I'd suggest that you also underscore the last couple of sentences from the paragraph that you've chosen to quote from Chalmers' write up: "No one need accept these [Maoists' gestures]at face value. But their truce had presented the state with a good opportunity to judge them by their actions." By suggesting we should not accept Maoist gestures "at face value" and by pointing that we should "judge them by their actions," I wonder how his thoughts would be in line with what you term "being in a state of denial about the Maoists". Mind you, the Maoists killed the policemen -- NOT that it was the right thing to do -- AFTER the state failed to reciprocrate the truce offer and further enhance the opportunity for peace in Nepal.