Maoist rebels launch attack in Nepal

KATMANDU, Nepal (CNN) -- More than 120 police and soldiers have been killed in a battle with Nepalese rebels.

The Maoist rebels seized the district headquarters of Mangalsen in the western district of Accham (about 450 km or 280 miles west of the capital, Katmandu), setting fire to government offices.

It was the biggest offensive launched by Maoist rebels since a state of emergency was declared in Nepal last November.

The rebels set fire to the district's government offices in the daring attack, which left at least 27 other police officers seriously injured, police officials said.

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According to information provided by security services, the rebels raided the district headquarters, Mangalsen, and an airstrip in nearby Sanfebagar at about midnight Sunday.

In the ensuing four-hour gun-battle, rebels destroyed an army barracks and a police station, torching many of the government office buildings in the town, a senior police officer said, on the condition of anonymity.

Authorities also said that district government's top administrator, as well as an intelligence officer and his wife, were gunned down by rebels.

At least 27 other police officers seriously injured in the violence, police officials said.

Authorities also said that scores of Maoist rebels are believed to have died in the fighting, but they could not put a number to it.

"We are still digging out the bodies from the rubble," a senior police officer said in Kathmandu.

A police official said the rebels attacked a jail housing Maoist inmates to release them, and raided a bank stealing 20 million rupees (about $300,000).

As the gun battle raged, authorities tried to rush in reinforcements by helicopter from Nepalgunj, a regional town on the southern plains, but were thwarted by rebel fire, police said.

Police sources said that about 45 policemen died defending the airstrip and the rest were killed in Mangalsen.

After several attempts, government choppers were finally able to land Sunday morning and recover the bodies of the dead policemen and soldiers, authorities said.

The attack comes five days ahead of a deadline by the government to decide whether it will renew the state of emergency.

The rebels, labeled as terrorists by the government, want to replace Nepal's constitutional monarchy and parliamentary democracy with a communist republic.

The government has repeatedly rejected those demands.

Since the rebel insurgency began in 1996 more than 2,000 people have been killed.

The government has had some success against the insurgents in urban areas since declaring the emergency.

The attack happened as Katmandu mobilizing its police and military to gain the upper hand in more remote regions of Nepal like Accham.

Critics of the state emergency saying it is diverting much needed funds from combating poverty that grips most of the Himalayan nation -- instead diverting them to security measures.