Home > News Archive > First Free Tibet protest in Bangladesh

First Free Tibet protest in Bangladesh

Tibet Sun newsroom | Tibet Sun

Bangladeshi Tibet supporters protest in front of the Chinese Embassy in the capital Dhaka marking 50 years in exile of the Dalai Lama in India on 31 March 2009. The activists carried banners calling for a free Tibet and demanded Tibet to be made a zone of peace.Drik News/Amdadul Huq/Bangladesh

Members of the newly formed Students for a Free Tibet in Bangladesh protested in front of the Chinese embassy to mark 50 years of the Chinese occupation of Tibet, and the Dalai Lama’s life in exile since then, according to a statement released by the Students for a Free Tibet in Dharamshala, India.

The protesters, including musicians, writers, artists and students, carried banners calling for a free Tibet, and for China to ‘stop the genocide in Tibet,’ in Dhaka’s Baridhara area.

Police rounded up all the activists in vans and had them detained at Gulshan police station in Dhaka.

The Dalai Lama arrived in India on 31 March 1959, 13 days after he set off to India to seek political asylum after the Chinese occupation of his country. He was followed by thousands of his followers.

The activists have said that Tibet and Bangladesh have longstanding historical ties. Atisha Dipankar Srijan (980-1053), an important figure in the Tibetan Buddhism is said to have been born in Vajrayogini village in Bikrampur, in Bangladesh.

The activists have said that a free Tibet will bring a secure Bangladesh. They also lashed out at the Chinese action in 1972 when it vetoed against Bangladesh from entering the UN.

Wasfia Nazreen founded the Bangladesh chapter of Students for a Free Tibet (BDSFT). She is the National Director of the new organisation.

Copyright © 2009 Tibet Sun

Published in Tibet Sun