AT LEAST 36 bus passengers were killed and scores more wounded when Maoist rebels detonated a landmine along a road in southern Nepal yesterday in one of the bloodiest attacks against civilians in the nine-year-long insurgency.

The bus, which was travelling near Narayangadh, in Chitwan district, home to one of Nepal’s most famous national parks, was crammed with more than a hundred passengers inside and on the roof.

It was blown apart as it went through the village of Madi, an area where Maoist rebels have been gathering in strength over the past couple of years. Army officers who arrived soon afterwards described a scene of carnage. “The place is littered with blood. Limbs are scattered around the site,” one said. “Many women and children have been killed.”

Military officials rushed journalists by helicopter to the scene to document the carnage as bloody bodies were laid out. For the Royal Nepal Army, battling accusations of human rights abuses against civilians, the attack was a propaganda coup.

Such an attack on civilians will do little for the Maoists’ cause, given their claim to be fighting for the liberation of the people. More than 11,000 have died since they began the “People’s War” in 1996 to overthrow the monarchy. Human rights groups say that at least twice the number of civilians have been killed by the army as by the rebels.

Although notoriously brutal against established enemies such as the army and feudal landlords, the Maoists have sought to avoid large-scale civilian killings. An earlier bus bombing that killed civilians was justified on the ground that army personnel were also on board. Whether this attack was for the same reason remained unclear last night, with no word from the rebels.

The bombing came amid rising violence in southern Nepal, where the army has been active in organising and encouraging local militias to fight against the Maoists. The strategy came soon after the royal coup in February, when King Gyanendra dismissed the Government and took power, a move he justified as necessary to concentrate the fight against the rebels. Many have seen the move as playing into the rebels’ hands, casting the King as the usurper of democracy and the enemy of the people.

The Maoists have used the opportunity to reach out to the deposed political parties, seeking an anti-King alliance. Diplomats say that they have also been trying to improve their image in the countryside, such as paying for meals they take from villagers rather than barging into their houses and demanding them.

This attack, however, would seem only to justify claims by the palace and the army that they face an extraordinary enemy against whom only extraordinary powers will work.

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