Nepal

This seems like a step in the right direction:

Nepal's royal government freed the chief of the country's biggest communist group and restored some mobile phone services, officials said on Monday, two days after an emergency ended in the Himalayan nation.

Officials said Madhav Kumar Nepal, the chief of the Communist Party of Nepal-UML, and another communist leader, Amrit Kumar Bohara, were released from house arrest late on Sunday.

The release of the two leaders came three months after King Gyanendra sacked the government, suspended civil rights and detained top politicians, blaming them for failing to tackle a deadly Maoist insurgency.

The king, faced with mounting international pressure to restore democracy and free politicians, lifted the emergency over the weekend but has retained extraordinary powers he assumed on Feb. 1.