Home > News Archive > Three more arrested in Kardze, Derge tense

Three more arrested in Kardze, Derge tense

Tibet Sun newsroom | Tibet Sun

Kardze in an undated file photo. Three more people in Kardze have been arrested by Chinese authorities on 21 March, as the farming boycott movement continues. Situation in Derge is also said to be tense after protests.File photo/TCHRD handout/China

Three more Tibetans in Kardze have been arrested by Chinese authorities on 21 March in connection with the farming boycott movement, reports the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy (TCHRD), citing sources in Tibet.

Dhunka Dorjee and Tsering Wangrak, both 40 years of age, and Pachen, aged 30, from Khang-Nyin-Nang village in Kardze, were arrested by Public Security Bureau officials on charges of their involvement in the farming boycott movement.

Sources told TCHRD that an unidentified Tibetan fled towards a nearby mountain when police came to arrest him.

Earlier on 19 March, 27-year-old Jampa Dhondup, a monk of Tse-Tsang monastery had been arrested over his involvement in the same movement.

The situation is said to be tense in Kardze as the movement to boycott farming continued to gain momentum. Streets were filled with posters and people were vowing to boycott farming activities in the region.

Local authorities had called a public meeting and warned that “anyone who defies farming will face arrest and their land will be officially confiscated.”

Most of the youths in Kardze had been arrested and detained by the Chinese authorities for their participation in protests since March last year, TCHRD says, adding, “Even if people in Kardze wish to till their lands, there is hardly any manpower left to do the farming work.”

TCHRD says that Tibetans are desperate, and giving up tilling their fields is a sign of defiance against the Chinese authorities.

People in Kardze have been actively engaged in anti-government protests since March 2008. A large number of armed security forces have been deployed in the area to thwart any untoward incident. The security forces outnumber the local inhabitants, TCHRD says.

Meanwhile, the Tibetan government-in-exile reports that the situation in Dzogchen township in Derge, Karze Autonomous Region, is “critical”, after Tibetans living in the region distributed a large number of leaflets calling for Tibetan independence on the eve of an important religious gathering on 22 March.

A large number of local Tibetans and pilgrims gathered at Dzongchen monastery to observe ‘Phurchen’, an important religious day on 23 March.

On the eve of the gathering, leaflets calling for Tibetan independence, along with a large number of copies of Lungta, a printed material for good luck, were scattered all over the main road leading to the monastery.

The sources said that the slogans on the pamphlets have been printed using wooden blocks.

Citing sources, the exile government said on its website that a tense situation has been prevailing in the region.

In a separate incident, a Tibetan monk staged a lone protest in Lithang, also in Karze Autonomous Region, on 22 March. The monk was identified as 18-year-old Choekyong Tsering of Lithang monastery.

He shouted slogans: “Long live His Holiness the Dalai Lama,”: and “Independence for Tibet”. He was severely beaten by police, and is presently locked up in Lithang county prison.

Copyright © 2009 Tibet Sun

Published in Tibet Sun