Students expelled from school in Tibet for staging protests: rights group Thursday, 2 July 2009, 9:36 a.m.

Students staged a demonstration in Labrang,Photo Courtesy:  VOA (Tibetan Language Service)

Dharamshala: Two Tibetan students were expelled from their school for taking part in a peaceful protests against the irregularities by the Chinese government in allocating reserve seats in higher education in Sangchu County in Kanlho Tibet Autonomous Prefecture (incorporated into China’s Gansu Province), a human rights group based in Dharamsala said 30 June. Disgruntled students of Kanlho Tibetan Middle School in Sangchu County took to streets on 24 April to protest against the malpractice of allocating of reserved seats of Tibetan students to Chinese students in higher education by the school authorities, Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy (TCHRD) said citing reliable sources. Two students – Dolma Tashi a.k.a. Dolta, 21 years old and Dolma Bum a.k.a. Dolbum, 22 years old – were expelled from their school on 19 June 2009. According to the latest information obtained by TCHRD, other factor for the students taking to street was accrued to the article published under the pseudonym of Yidor entitled “Deception and Meanness of Dalai Lama” and “No Escape for the Dalai” published in bilingual Kanlho Daily, the latter article was not only published in newspaper but it had also been put up on the school notice board,” TCHRD quoted a reliable sources as saying. “Unable to tolerate the smear campaign carried out against their beloved leader, the students started off the demonstration from their school, Kanlho Tibetan Middle School, and headed towards the county main market area raising slogans,” a reliable source told TCHRD.. The local Public Security Bureau (PSB) stopped the students in the outskirts of the main market area. According to sources on the ground, the students were driven back to the school and a strong contingent of Public Security Bureau Personnels and People’s Armed Police (PAP) have surrounded the school barring anyone from entering or leaving. The parents of the students have been summoned at the school and they were asked to ensure that no such demonstration will take place in future. Another 13 students from Sangchu Tibetan Nationality Elementary School were arrested for their peaceful demonstration on 30 April 2009 but subsequently released after brief detention. These protests were result of defaming article published in Kanlho Daily which has a large circulation and the students demonstrated with the slogan “Stop Defaming the Dalai Lama, TCHRD said. According to TCHRD, Kanlho Prefecture has been witnessing peaceful protest by Tibetan people at regular interval and instead of taking up the matter in constructive manner; the Chinese authorities are busy imposing new and varied restrictions. These acts of Chinese authorities are not only against the wishes of people but also against the fundamental rights enshrined under the Chinese constitution.