Eight rebels died in four gunbattles with troops, police said. Another Maoist was gunned down as he threatened shopkeepers to enforce the strike in the southeastern Ilam district, police official Krishna Basnet said.

A blast shattered windows of the Nepal-Bangladesh Bank and several houses at Lalitpur on the capital's outskirts but caused no casualties, police said.

They described the bombing as a scare tactic to enforce the two-day stoppage called by the Maoists, who are fighting to overthrow the monarchy.

"Two Maoists in a taxi stopped at an engineering college outside the bank and left a bag of explosives, which the driver threw out causing the blast. We think the goal was to blow up the taxi," Lalitpur Chief District Officer Thaneswore Devkota said.

"This was an attempt by the Maoists to scare people into observing their strike," Devkota told AFP.

Suspected rebels stopped and set ablaze 10 vehicles in the central Dhading district. They were headed to Kathmandu as part of a month-long tour of Asia by activists lobbying for land rights for peasants.

Police said the attackers did not harm the 19 activists and five journalists on the People's Caravan for Food Sovereignty, who were mostly from other Asian countries.

The Maoists also claim to be fighting for the rural poor but were upset that the activists were defying the strike, a police officer said.

"These activists were fighting for the rights of poor farmers. I am very ashamed they were attacked," said Bamdev Gautam, president of the All Nepal Peasants Association which was helping arrange the trip.

The guerrillas, who enjoy free rein in much of the countryside, have been building pressure on the government which has tried unsuccessfully to resume talks to end the insurgency that has claimed 10,000 lives since 1996.

Most stores remained closed in Kathmandu and other cities in eastern Nepal and long-distance bus services were halted. But police said there was more traffic on the roads of the capital than during past Maoist strikes, which saw a complete shutdown.

The government had threatened to withdraw official cars from public employees who observed the stoppage.

The rebels in past strikes have destroyed cars whose drivers defied their orders. The home ministry has promised to compensate 90 percent of any damages inflicted during the shutdown.

Streetside vendors also defied the strike Tuesday, which fell on the second day of the Kumari harvest festival. The Maoists have pledged not to interfere with the five-day pageant which is a major tourist attraction.

The tourist industry had appealed for the strike to be called off. Tourism supports 1.25 million jobs in the cash-strapped kingdom.

The Maoists called the strike Tuesday and Wednesday to protest at the alleged killing of two senior rebels by troops on September 3. An army spokesman denied troops killed the pair.

In August the guerrillas ordered traffic not to enter or leave Kathmandu for a week, sending prices of fresh produce soaring in the city of 1.5 million.

Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba has invited the Maoists to resume talks which broke down in August 2003 over rebel demands for a convention to draft a new constitution.

Maoist chief Pushpa Kamal Dahal, better known as "Prachanda," or "The Fierce," said Friday the rebels would only negotiate if they were certain the talks would not be scuttled by King Gyanendra, whom he blamed for the failure of two previous peace bids.