A Tibetan monk in the west of China set himself on fire in an anti-government protest, then was beaten and kicked by police, prompting hundreds of monks and others to rally, an exiled Tibetan monk said.
The 21-year-old monk, Phuntsog, who like many Tibetans goes by only one name, set himself on fire on Wednesday afternoon on a main street near the Kirti monastery in Aba, Sichuan Province, said Kusho Tsering, a monk now living in Dharmsala, India.
A man who answered the phone yesterday at the Public Security Bureau in Aba said he did not know anything about the case and hung up.
A man who answered the phone at the media office of the Chinese Communist Party in Aba said his office did not know the specifics of the matter.
“The main office of the communist party in Aba County is on top of this issue,” said the man, who would give only his surname, Zhang.
The phone rang unanswered at the main office.
“The monks in the Kirti monastery are always trying to find ways to protest against Chinese rule in Tibet,” Tsering, who is from the same monastery, said late on Wednesday. “It’s an obvious way to show the resentment of the Tibetan people.”
The account highlights simmering tensions in Tibet and Tibetan-inhabited regions in western China amid several anniversaries this month, including the March 10 anniversary of the unsuccessful revolt against China that caused the Dalai Lama to flee in 1959. Aba County has for years been the scene of large protests involving hundreds of monks and citizens.
Within 15 minutes of the monk’s self-immolation, police and plainclothes security officers turned up and extinguished the fire, but also beat and kicked the monk, Tsering said.
Angered by the beating, monks and Tibetan residents carried the monk back to the monastery, then marched along the main street, before police intervened, said Tsering, who added he received the information from two eyewitnesses and two residents.
Tsering said he did not know if Phuntsog survived.
Tsering spoke in Tibetan by telephone, with the help of an International Campaign for Tibet researcher in Dharmsala, who translated.
Wednesday marked the three-year anniversary of what Tibetan activists and residents have described as a bloody crackdown by police on a large demonstration at the Kirti monastery.
It came just days after rioting broke out in the Tibetan capital of Lhasa on March 14, 2008, which left 22 people dead and led to the most sustained Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule in decades.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not