Nepal yesterday extended the mandates for two commissions tasked with probing crimes committed during the bloody civil war, hours before a deadline was due to lapse without a single case being investigated.

The commissions had been given two years to look into the murders, rapes and forced disappearances perpetrated by government forces and Maoist rebels during the decade-long conflict, which ended in 2006.

Their mandates were set to expire at midnight yesterday, leaving thousands of victims in limbo, but in an eleventh-hour decision Kathmandu agreed to extend the investigation period.

"The term of the two commissions have been extended by a year," Information Minister Surendra Kumar Karki told AFP.