The Council meeting of UAAA (Asian Mountaineering and Climbing Federation) was held in Hongkong from 30th May – 1st June 2014. The UAAA is the highest Asian governing body of all mountaineering, climbing and mountain tourism activities in Asia. The Council meeting was mainly attained by officials of national alpine federations and national mountaineering federations from all over the Asia.

During the meeting many questions were raised to our delegation such as the Mt. Everest incident in Spring 2014, commercial and non-commercial mountaineering and adventure tourism, traffic on Mt. Everest, fixing of ladder at the Hillary Step of Mt. Everest, garbage on Mt. Everest, impact of Climate Change and Global Warming in the high Himalayan regions and the threat of glacial lake outburst floods. To respond to these points, I as President of NMA and Honorary member of the UIAA addressed the gathering several times during the two day's event. A summary of my talk, reflecting the view of the Nepalese Delegation, is given below. A full transcript of his talks is in attachment.

1. Everest Incident: Informed to the UAAA Council meeting, that an avalanche hit Khubu Icefall, near Camp 1 at the height of 5800m of Mt Everest on 18 April morning at 6:45 am, killing 13 mountaineers and 3 still missing. The avalanche came sweeping from the Khumbu Icefall and hammered over the climbing Sherpas, who were heading to Camp I to carrying logistics, to set up camps and fix ropes for the climbers of different expedition teams.

The site is at an elevation of 5,800m, in between the base camp and Camp I. NMA's Executive Board Member Dorje Khatri also died in the same incident. All the Nepalese climbers died and missing in the avalanche are equal for Nepal Mountaineering Association (NMA) and we don't want any climber to be ignored in the course of receiving financial assistance. It is also worthwhile to mention that Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation (MoCTCA) has already decided to give us the responsibility to look after the management of education of the children of the deceased mountaineers. That is why we are in the process of creating basket fund for the support of surviving members. Hence we have created an account named Mountaineering Disaster Relief and Educational Support Fund, briefly called MDRES Fund, in which donations received from all over the world will be deposited. The fund will be used for the support of children of mountaineers died not only on 18 April, but also for the children of deceased mountaineers, who may lose lives in future incident.

Similarly, the ministry is also planning to handover NMA the management of few more peaks and from the income generated, certain amount of the fund will be used for MDRES FUND. These two decisions helped in the increment of our morale to request to all our concerned friends and association for the extension of their support for the welfare of families of Nepalese mountaineers. 

It is worthwhile to mention that Seven Summits Actions for Sustainable Society (SSASS), Japan should be appreciated for its generous support for the surviving members of the climbers. Ken Noguchi, President of SSASS, who initiated and showed interest to support for the families, hence he committed to support of US $ 100,000: (One Hundred Thousand US Dollar) and Dr. Lee In-Jeung, President of UAAA’s contribution of US$ 3,200: (Three Thousand Two Hundred US Dollar). 

We would like to extend our request to all the friend of Nepal to help in achieving our objective to take care of the families of deceased mountaineers, who may die during mountaineering in future. 

In the aftermath of the terrible tragedy that took the lives of 16 climbing Sherpas, I think many people around the world would be interested in learning more about the daily lives of the "fabled" Sherpas. It would also be very good to show the human side of Sherpa; that they aren't just machines that climb mountains; that they too have hopes, fears, and aspirations. The century long reputation of the entire Sherpa community's hard work, dedication, deliberation, honesty, courage and sacrifices for the sake of putting so many climbers on the top of Mt. Everest and other Himalayan peaks will remain forever.

by Ang Tshering

president of Nepal Mountaineering Association