China Arrests 100 Tibetan monks

by Barbara McPherson | March 23, 2009 at 10:06 am

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China has taken into custody about one hundred Tibetan monks claiming that they were rioting. This claim has been disputed by Thubten Samphel, the spokesperson for the Tibetan government in exile.

The government of China seems determined to persecute the followers of the Dalai Lama, extending its influence on S. Africa to deny the religious leader entry for a peace conference.

Chinese police have arrested nearly 100 monks after what they describe as a riot by hundreds of Tibetans, according to state media.

The official Xinhua news agency said all but two of the 95 arrested in the ethnic Tibetan area of the western province of Qinghai on Sunday were monks.

Thubten Samphel, a spokesman for the Tibetan government-in-exile, based in the Indian city of Dharamsala, told Al Jazeera that the protest was peaceful and was organised in response to the apparent suicide of a monk under investigation for unfurling a Tibetan flag.

"What we know is that the incident took place on Saturday, and that several monks raised the Tibetan flag, and pulled down a Chinese flag and they were arrested."

"The protest was peaceful, and not violent."

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