According to Chief of Protocol Mohan Krishna Shrestha, the non-machine readable passports to be issued from Monday onward will bear a stamp reading "this is not a machine readable passport." [break]
The ministry took the decision to this effect after it filed a difference at the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) on March 22, expressing its inability to introduce machine-readable passports (MRPs) on April 1.
The ICAO, the UN agency, has already circulated Nepal´s difference among its member countries. Member countries generally accept such differences filed by another member country.
The government has committed to the ICAO member countries that it is introducing the machine readable passports from August 1 after missing the April 1 deadline.
But the traditional passports will be available only from the ministry and Nepali missions abroad. Earlier, passports were available in all district administration offices.
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