VARIOUS: Tibetans in Nepal and India hold anti-China rallies as French foreign minister calls for an end to Beijing's "repressson" of Tibetans

Record ID: 492628

  • Title: VARIOUS: Tibetans in Nepal and India hold anti-China rallies as French foreign minister calls for an end to Beijing's "repressson" of Tibetans
  • Date: 25th March 2008
  • Summary: (BN10) KATHMANDU, NEPAL (MARCH 25, 2008) (REUTERS) POLICE GUARDING CHINESE EMBASSY VISA SECTION GATE PROTESTING TIBETANS RUNNING ALONG ROAD POLICE CHASING TIBETAN MONKS TIBETANS PROTESTING AGAINST CHINA VARIOUS OF TUSSLES BETWEEN TIBETAN PROTESTERS AND POLICE TWO MONKS HOLDING A BANNER MONKS SCUFFLING WITH POLICE AN INJURED MONK LYING ON GROUND VARIOUS OF TUSSLES BETWEEN PROTESTERS AND POLICE AS MONKS ARE ARRESTED (SOUNDBITE) (Nepali) ARRESTED YOUNG WOMAN SAYING: "We didn't come here to fight, we came here for peace." PROTESTERS CONFRONTING POLICE POLICE HITTING PROTESTER WITH STICK PROTESTER ON GROUND CRYING IN PAIN SOUNDBITE (English) A YOUNG WOMAN SAYING: "Please the world help us. Please the world help us." POLICE BATON CHARGING DEMONSTRATORS MONKS IN POLICE VAN SHOUTING POLICE BUNDLING PROTESTER SIN TO VAN VAN MOVING AWAY WITH PROTESTERS INSIDE SHOUTING
  • Embargoed: 9th April 2008 13:00
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  • Topics: International Relations
  • Reuters ID: LVAE47G9FCEA9XPNHP4T1LQCLHU4
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  • Story Text: Tibetans protesting against China clash with police in Nepal as peaceful protests are held in Dharamsala, India. French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner calls for an end to Beijing's "repression" of Tibetans and the lifting of China's ban on foreign reporting of the protests.
    Nepalese police baton-charged anti-China demonstrators and detained dozens of protesters on Tuesday (March 25).
    Kathmandu has been the scene of almost daily anti-China protests since March 10, the 49th anniversary of a failed uprising against Chinese rule.
    On Tuesday, protesters were picked up by police and dragged into trucks or vans in front of a Chinese consulate office in the Nepali capital.
    Police said 71 protesters were held and sent to different detention centres.
    One protesting monk was seen falling to the ground after being beaten by police.

    "We didn't come here to fight, we came here for peace," said one young protester.
    More than 20,000 Tibetans have been living in Nepal since fleeing the Himalayan region after a failed uprising against Beijing in 1959.
    Kathmandu says they are free to stay but cannot hold any political activity in Nepal, which considers Tibet as part of China, a key donor to its economic development.
    French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner on Tuesday stepped up his country's criticism of China over its handling of violence in Tibet, calling for an end to repression there.

    "The violence must end on both sides but above all the repression must end since now one cannot go to Tibet," he told Europe 1 radio on Tuesday.

    "One of the demands, which I have formulated several times, is that the journalists who are blocked around Tibet can go there. Information must circulate," Kouchner, a former human rights activist, said.
    China's bar on foreign media in Tibet and surrounding areas has made independent verification of reports of unrest in Tibet and ethnic Tibetan areas there difficult.
    In India's northern Dharamsala hundreds of Tibetans-in-exile carried out a silent peace march to extend their support to fellow Tibetans in China.
    The Himalayan town of Dharamsala is home to hundreds and thousands of Tibetan exiles and their parliament in exile.
    The Dalai Lama, Tibetans' spiritual leader, has been urging Tibetans to use non-violent means to achieve their goals of gaining greater autonomy from China.
    China alleges that the Dalai Lama conspired to wreck the forthcoming Beijing Olympic Games and masterminded a wave of protests that began with peaceful rallies in Tibet's capital Lhasa on March 10.
    Five days later, the marches erupted into a riot in the capital that China says killed 19 people.
    The Tibetan government-in-exile in India raised its death toll in the clashes to 130 on Monday (March 24).
    The Dalai Lama rejects China's claim that he is behind the protests and says he does not oppose Beijing's Games.
    Chinese police have arrested three Tibetan women on charges of arson during riots on March 14 that erupted across Tibet and the ethnic Tibetan area of China, Chinese television channel CCTV reported on Tuesday.
    Three Tibetan women confessed their crimes, a spokeswoman for China's police force earlier told reporters.
    Five teenager girls burnt to death and one escaped in the arson attack, CCTV said.
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