Kathmandu, July 21 -- The selection process for new ambassadors, which began a month and a half ago, has entered its final stage, with the foreign minister expected to make recommendations next week.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs had on May 28 invited applications through an open call to fill vacant envoy positions in 13 countries, including India, China, the US, the UK, and Australia, and set June 5 as the deadline. More than 4,400 applications were received. After removing duplicate and incomplete applications, officials selected 2,700 before shortlisting a few hundred applications.

The shortlist was forwarded to Foreign Minister Shisir Khanal's secretariat for final consideration.

"Shortlisting was a Herculean task as one individu...