A recent claim alleging that mountain climbing guides in Nepal were poisoning climbers to get them sick in order to “fake rescue” them has been covered by several media outlets.
While the 'fake rescue' part is real, there has been no evidence that any of the climbers were actually poisoned, according to information in the chargesheet, which was accessed by Climbing.com.
On March 22, charges were filed against 32 people in the Kathmandu district court over a fake rescue scam worth $20 million, where they earned from insurance payouts made to the clients.
The investigation into the allegation lasted about eight years.
The 32 people who were charged under the Organised Crime Prevention Act included tour managers, rescue coordinators, hospital owners, doctors, and trekking guides
They were accused of organising unnecessary helicopter flights for non-emergency clients. The allegations state that these individuals called for conducting fake rescues, forging passenger manifests, and manipulating medical records in order to boost claims to their clients’ rescue insurance and split the profit.
While the insurance scam was found to be very well evidenced, the details about the poisoned food, which were highlighted by several large media outlets, were not part of the 748-page charge sheet.
The allegation was that some trekking guides gave their clients food laced with baking soda or gave them acetazolamide (Diamox) in order to make them sick or dehydrated, which would justify the helicopter rescue.
However, authorities in Nepal could not find any evidence for this detail.
The Central Investigation Bureau (CIB) of Nepal told Climbing.com via email that “To date, the official investigation has not found any evidence of ‘poisoning.’”
On Friday, the CIB addressed the inaccuracies of the reports in a press release signed by Shiva Kumar Shrestha, senior superintendent of police.
“The CIB’s serious attention has been drawn to news reports broadcasted across national and international media regarding the fake rescue of tourists,” the statement read. “These reports allege that trekking guides in the Everest region made tourists ill by mixing poisonous substances into their food to facilitate ‘fake rescues.’ During the investigation conducted so far, no facts have been found to suggest that poisonous substances were mixed into food,” the statement concludes.
The poisoning claim was originally made by one guide, Udhav Bahadur Thapa, who is not a defendant in the case. “I have heard that foreigners are made ill by mixing baking powder into their food,” he said. The statement had been used to spread the poisoning claim. No other witnesses or guides had made similar statements.
