17 years later, senior foreign ministry official charged over alleged misuse of travel documents

The case alleges that Joint Secretary Pushpa Raj Bhattarai approved Nepal-issued travel documents for five Tibetans from Indian refugee camps based on forged documents.

In 2009, five Tibetans arrived at the German Embassy in Kathmandu carrying Nepal-issued travel documents and seeking visas to join relatives who had been granted asylum in Germany. They claimed they were recent arrivals from Tibet. But their documents soon raised a troubling question: how had newcomers to Nepal obtained official travel papers so quickly?