By Barbara Demick, Los Angeles Times –
BEIJING — As China launched its 18th Communist Party Congress on Thursday, news of the self-immolations of several Tibetans opposed to Chinese rule helped illustrate the internal tensions facing the country’s new leadership.
Over the past 48 hours, at least five Tibetans and possibly six were reported to have set themselves on fire in western China. Most of them were teenagers.
Up to 6,000 people demonstrated against China on Thursday afternoon in Tongren, a monastery town in Qinghai province, following two self-immolations — a 23-year-old woman on Wednesday and a young former monk on Thursday, exile groups reported.
“The situation there is very tense as Chinese armed forces have placed severe restrictions on movement in the town and are now closing-in on the protesters,” a member of the Tibetan parliament in exile told the Tibetan news service, Phayul.
“We have heard that 2,000 to 6,000 people demonstrated, which are plausible numbers given that there have been protests of that size before,” said Harriet Beaumont, a spokeswoman for the London-based Free Tibet.
She said that the protests were in reaction to the stifling Chinese security measures, the presence of troops, intimidating footage on television and harsh sentences doled out to anybody involved in a protest or even telling people outside about protests.
“Tibetans were also aware of the approach of the congress and that might be a factor in the serious escalation in the last few days,” said Beaumont.
In a speech opening the Congress, outgoing President Hu Jintao acknowledged criticism that China’s economic development had come at the expense of many of its people, and said authorities would crack down on high-level corruption. China also faces widespread accusations of repression leveled by ethnic groups such as Tibetans and Uighurs in the far northwest of the country.
Leading up to the congress, Chinese authorities blanketed Tibetan neighborhoods with armed police wearing riot gear and carrying fire extinguishers and erected barricades and checkpoints. Some Tibetans suspected of spreading anti-government information via email or social networking sites were arrested.
Wednesday was the deadliest single day since Tibetans began setting themselves on fire last year. Three were teenage monks, aged 15 to 16, from a small monastery on the outskirts of Aba, the Sichuan province county where the immolations began. They lighted themselves on fire simultaneously outside the gates of the town’s public security bureau, chanting “freedom for Tibet” and calling for the return of the exiled Dalai Lama.
The youngest, 15-year-old Dorje, died at the spot, while two others were taken to the hospital by police. The teenagers were all said to come from nomadic families.
About three hours later, 200 miles to the north, the woman in Tongren immolated herself in a pasture near her village. She was identified as 23-year-old Tamdrin Tso and said to have a 5-year-old son. Then on Thursday afternoon, a former monk called Jinpa immolated himself in a public square across from the town’s main monastery, setting off the protests. The exile groups said that nomads from throughout the county joined in the demonstrations and that high school students ripped down Chinese flags from public buildings.
Few details were available about another self-immolation reported to have taken place Wednesday in Driru county inside what is called the Tibetan Autonomous Region.
