Did you know that...

Nepal has been going through a civil war for eight years?

I like to consider myself fairly informed. Surely, I am not the most up-to-date guy on the block but I know more about the world than your average Joe. But I had no idea that there was a civil war going on in Nepal and that it has been raging for eight years. I read this story in the New York Times.

10,600 people have died and according to the article, tens of thousands of children have been abducted and forced into indoctrination camps by Maoist rebels fighting the government. Democracy was introduced in 1990, and in 1996 the rebels took up arms. Maoists occupy 2/3 of the country and have blockaded capital Kathmandu for months.