Home > News Archive > More security forces needed in Tibet: top official

More security forces needed in Tibet: top official

By Robert J. Saiget | AFP

Tibet Governor Jampa Phuntsok speaks during a press conference in the Tibet Room at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China on 6 March 2009. Tibet governor Jampa Phuntsok said a few disgruntled individuals may cause disturbances around the upcoming one-year anniversary of the rioting in Lhasa, but that authorities did not expect any large-scale disturbances.AP/Elizabeth Dalziel/China

Tibet has asked for more police and other security personnel, one of the region’s top leaders said Friday, expressing fears that the Dalai Lama’s supporters could create unrest.

Exiled Tibetan groups have warned of possible unrest in the region this year to coincide with the 50th anniversaries of an uprising against Chinese rule and the Dalai Lama’s exile.

“Our forces are not enough,” Jampa Phuntsok, chairman of the Tibet Autonomous Region, told reporters on the sidelines of China’s annual parliamentary session.

“We have asked for increases in the armed police, police, firemen, border forces and public security… incidents incited by the Dalai clique could happen again.”

Unrest has simmered in Tibet since anti-Chinese riots erupted a year ago on the 49th anniversary of the failed uprising that led to the exile of the region’s highest spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama.

Although Phuntsok said he expected exiled Tibetan forces to try to incite unrest again, he expressed confidence that the riots that began on 10 March last year would not occur again.

“We have taken all kinds of measures,” Phuntsok said. “Incidents like what happened on 14 March won’t happen again, we are fully confident of this.”

China has ruled Tibet since 1951, a year after sending in troops to “liberate” the Buddhist region.

On 28 March, Tibet will celebrate its first “Serf Emancipation Day,” commemorating the day in 1959 that China declared the uprising quelled, Legcog, Tibet’s top legislator, told journalists. Like many other Tibetans, he has just one name.

The day will also mark the 50th anniversary of the end of a centuries-old Tibetan Buddhist theocracy that ruled the Himalayan region and kept ordinary Tibetans in a state of slavery, he said.

“Serf Emancipation Day” also falls nearly 50 years to the day that the Dalai Lama, who remains revered by most Tibetan Buddhists, crossed into India to begin his exile.

Last year’s riots erupted in Tibet’s capital Lhasa after four days of peaceful protests to mark the 1959 uprising. The unrest quickly spread to neighbouring Tibetan-inhabited provinces.

Tibetan exiles say more than 200 people died as security forces cracked down. Phuntsok denied this but refrained from giving the actual number of deaths.

China has accused “rioters” of being responsible for 21 deaths.

Activist groups said Chinese authorities had hugely increased security in Tibetan areas. Several protests have already taken place ahead of this year’s anniversary, they said.

But Kang Jinzhong, an official with the Tibet Armed Police Division, told journalists that deployments of armed police were normal and no special forces had been deployed to the region.

He refused to say how many armed police and soldiers were stationed in Tibet.

Phuntsok said increased security forces in Tibet would be needed even if last year’s unrest had not happened.

“Tibet is a huge region… a lot of our townships do not even have police stations,” he said. “An appropriate increase is necessary.”

Copyright © 2009 AFP

Published in Yahoo News