Home > News Archive > Nepal steps up security to quell Tibetan protest

Nepal steps up security to quell Tibetan protest

By Binaj Gurubacharya | AP

Tibetan monks walk past policemen at the Bodhnath Stupa, a Buddhist religious place where majority Tibetans live, in Kathmandu, Nepal, on 14 March 2009. Nepal has stepped up security and warned Tibetans exiles against organising protests against China during the 51st anniversary of the failed Tibetan uprising.File photo/AP/Binod Joshi/Nepal

Nepal has stepped up security and warned Tibetans exiles against organising protests against China during the anniversary of the failed uprising that sent the Dalai Lama into exile, officials said Tuesday.

Home Ministry spokesman Jayamukunda Khanal said security around the Chinese Embassy and its visa office has been stepped up, with police guarding all roads leading to the area.

Khanal said the local representative of Dalai Lama, Trinlay Gyatso, was taken to the chief district officer Sunday and warned that no anti-China protests should take place.

Gyatso was allowed to leave after the meeting with the officials, Khanal said.

Wednesday marks the anniversary of the 10 March 1959, riots inside Tibet against Chinese rule that led to a crackdown and, later that month, the Dalai Lama’s dramatic flight across the Himalayas and into exile.

Tibetan exiles in Nepal are expected to demonstrate on the anniversary Wednesday, but they have not made any public announcements, fearing a police crackdown.

Tibetans in Nepal have been protesting regularly against China since 2008. Police usually detain protesters for a few hours and then release them.

Nepal has been under pressure from Western nations to allow the protests, and from China to stop them.

Thousands of Tibetan exiles live in Nepal, and hundreds more are allowed to pass through the country on their way to Dharamshala, India, where the Dalai Lama lives in exile.

The protests are a source of embarrassment to Nepal’s government, which wants strong ties with China. Beijing has repeatedly asked Nepal to better control the Tibetan refugees within its borders and stop the protests.

China claims Tibet has always been part of its territory, but many Tibetans say the Himalayan region was virtually independent for centuries until Chinese troops invaded in the 1950s.

Copyright © 2010 AP

Published in Yahoo News