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By Tenzin Choephel
Phayul Correspondent
Kathmandu, April 21: Over 200 Tibetan volunteers staged a peaceful demonstration at the UN House in Pulchowk, Kathmandu this afternoon to request UN’s intervention in alleviating the alleged mal-treatment of Tibetans by Chinese Communist authorities inside Tibet. Tibetans were able to protest for about 30 minutes before they were arrested.
About 139 people were arrested and are now detained at Metropolitan Police Range Lalitpur, Jwalakhel. During the arrest, two women protesters sustained injuries.
The protest started at around 2:20 PM when over 200 Tibetans arrived near the UN House intersection. The protesters tried to push towards the UN House’s main gate but Police stopped and cornered them at the intersection, and started arresting them. As usual, protesters resisting arrest were lathi-charged, kicked and punched.
Many, including women, were dragged and shoved into Police vehicles. Among the protesters was a 13-year old Tibetan boy also.
At the time of filing this story, those arrested Tibetans were still held under detention.
Human Rights Watch on Sunday urged the Government of Nepal to stop illegal detention of Tibetans and to respect their right to peaceful expression and assembly. The rights group noted that the police arrested over 2500 Tibetan protestors in the past five weeks.
“The government cannot be selective about who in Nepal is entitled to such basic rights – Tibetans there are entitled to peaceful expression and assembly too,” Sophie Richardson, HRW’s Asia advocacy director, said in a statement.
Tibetan protestors have been regularly demonstrating in Kathmandu since March 10, the 49th anniversary of the Tibetan uprising day.
At a site in the sacred Swayambhu hill, groups of Tibetans have been carrying out a 24-hour relay hunger strike. The chain hunger strike has entered its ninth consecutive day and over 550 people have participated in the sit-in protest so far.
The Kantipur Daily Nepali language newspaper today said that the Chinese Government has agreed to give Nepali Government a loan of 20 million US dollars at 1.75 % interest rate for the 60-megawatt Upper Trishuli hydro power station. Nepali Government has reiterated that it could not tolerate any anti-China activities on its soil.
China’s lavishing economic aid to Nepal and Nepal’s kowtowing to China has created a hard situation for Tibetan refugees in Nepal.
The Olympic torch relay in Indonesia will be limited to Jakarta’s main sports complex amid threats from 17 groups to disrupt the ceremony.
“I’ve been told by the police intelligence that up to 17 groups plan to disrupt the torch relay tomorrow… They are from Falungong, free-Tibet groups and Greenpeace,” Sumohadi Marsis, head of the Olympic torch organizing committee in Jakarta, said on Monday.
Sumohadi said only 5,000 people with official invitations would be allowed into the Gelora Bung Karno stadium to see the relay which will be secured by 2,500 forces, starting at 2:00 pm local time.
“The torch-bearers will go around the main stadium… about seven kilometers,” Ritha Subowo, head of Indonesia’s sports committee told reporters.
The torch is due to arrive in Jakarta at 12:15 am Tuesday from Kuala Lumpur and will be carried directly to the Shangri La Hotel in central Jakarta.
KUALA LUMPUR (AFP) — The Olympic torch set off through the Malaysian capital Monday to rapturous cheers from Chinese supporters and tight security by police keen to avoid the disruption seen on earlier legs.
More than 1,000 police and other security forces were deployed on the route from the city centre to the iconic Petronas Twin Towers.
It was a party atmosphere as brass bands entertained the crowds gathered on Independence Square, which had been turned into a sea of red Chinese flags.
“It is a festive atmosphere here… and shows the good relationship we have with Beijing,” Olympic Committee of Malaysia president Imran Jaafar said.
The torch, symbol of the Beijing Games, is on the Asian stretch of a world tour that was severely disrupted in Europe and the United States by protesters complaining about China’s rule in Tibet and its human rights record.
Police in Kuala Lumpur were taking no chances, and swiftly intervened when pro-China supporters confronted a Japanese family waving a Tibetan flag.
An AFP reporter who saw the incident said a group of Chinese nationals set upon the family and their child, hitting them with inflated plastic batons and shouting: “Taiwan and Tibet belong to China.”
Police escorted the family to a station to check on their travel documents, senior police official W. Karthik told AFP.
More than 500 people gathered at Independence Square with numerous Chinese students wearing red and white T-shirts emblazoned with “One dream, one world, one China.” They cheered wildly when the relay began.
China’s communist rulers were banking on the Olympic Games to showcase the nation’s much-touted “peaceful rise” to power, but the torch relay that began in Greece last month has become a high-profile target for activists.
It follows a crackdown on violent protests in March against Chinese rule in Tibet, with exiled leaders saying 150 people were killed.
China says Tibetan “rioters” killed 20 people.
Protests in London, Paris and San Francisco led Jacques Rogge, head of the International Olympic Committee, to say the Games were in “crisis,” but since then Beijing has bluntly told him to stay out of “irrelevant” politics.
Hundreds of protesters were arrested in India and Nepal last week when the torch was carried through New Delhi, while a landmark Buddhist temple scrapped plans to host the launch of Japan’s leg in the mountain town of Nagano — it will now take place in a parking lot due to fears of further protests.
After Kuala Lumpur, the torch relay travels to Indonesia, Australia, South Korea, Japan and Vietnam before heading to China.
Authorities in Nepal have deployed security forces on their side of Mount Everest to prevent pro-Tibet protests when the torch is carried to the summit early next month.
Australia has beefed up security for Thursday’s relay in Canberra, which is expected to attract pro-Tibet groups and supporters of the Beijing Games.
Officials say nearly half the capital’s police force will be on duty.
Meanwhile in Shanghai, the visiting French Senate leader passed on a letter from President Nicolas Sarkozy to a wheelchair-bound Chinese athlete who was forced to protect the torch from pro-Tibet protesters during the chaotic April 7 Paris leg of the relay.
The protests have triggered a backlash in China. At the weekend, thousands of people demonstrated outside branches of the French retail giant Carrefour in several cities, angry at allegations — which the chain has denied — that it supports the Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama.
Tensions could be inflamed though by plans by city councillors in Paris to confer honorary citizenship on the Dalai Lama.
