A Tibetan Buddhist monk who was detained for six months without charge after he posted a video alleging rights abuse on YouTube has been released, two of his lawyers and an overseas group said yesterday.
The senior monk, Jigme, who like many Tibetans uses just one name, was detained after he put an account on YouTube about being abused when he was detained during a crackdown that followed riots across Tibetan areas of China in March last year.
Jiang Tianyong (江天勇) said he and another well-known activist lawyer, Li Fangping (李方平), went last week to Xiahe County, the site of Jigme’s Labrang monastery in western Gansu Province, but were not able to see Jigme, or a police officer in charge of the case.
“I learned yesterday that he was just released. We don’t know why he was taken, why he was released or the terms of his release,” Jiang said.
Hundreds of people have been detained in the crackdown following the deadly rioting in Tibet’s capital of Lhasa on March 14, and more than 70 sentenced in quick trials.
The Tibetan Government in Exile says they did not receive a fair trial.
Li said it is likely Jigme was released on bail, but police didn’t show the family or him any evidence and gave no explanation.
Jigme was seized by police on Nov. 4 when he returned to the Labrang monastery in Xiahe after being in hiding, the Washington-based International Campaign for Tibet said.
In a telephone interview in September, Jigme described how he was interrogated and abused for two months after four uniformed guards dragged him into a van in March last year.
An account of his detention was posted on YouTube, after which he went into hiding.
Jigme said he did not take part in the protests, the most sustained Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule in decades.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS