Nepal police firing kills four anti-charter protesters

Kathmandu

 Four demonstrators died in Nepal Wednesday after being shot by police as fresh protests erupted in the country's southern plains over a new draft constitution.

 Police fired shots and tear gas when thousands of protesters surrounded their headquarters in the southeastern district of Mahottari and torched the house of a local judge.

 "Three sustained bullet injuries in the clash and died while undergoing treatment," police spokesman Kamal Singh Bam told AFP.

 "A curfew has been imposed until further notice in Mahottari."

 A fourth man was killed in the nearby district of Saptari when police fired at hundreds of protestors who threw stones and bottles as police tried to escort vehicles through a blocked national highway.

 Anger has been building for weeks in southern Nepal after lawmakers struck a breakthrough deal on a new constitution, spurred by April's devastating earthquake.

 Plans to divide the Himalayan nation into seven provinces have sparked fury among historically marginalised communities including the Madhesi and Tharu ethnic minorities, who say the new internal borders will limit their political representation.

 The latest casualties mean that 30 people including 10 police officers and an 18-month-old boy have died in the violence that first broke out last month.

 UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon last week called for an end to the clashes and urged Nepal's politicians to hold talks with protesters.

 Work on a new national constitution began in 2008, two years after the end of the Maoist insurgency that left an estimated 16,000 people dead and brought down the 240-year-old Hindu monarchy.

 But negotiations faltered over the issue of internal borders and the resulting uncertainty left Nepal -- one of the world's poorest countries -- in political limbo.