Australian Greens, MEP Provera raise concern over military blockade of Kirti Monastery[Saturday, 16 April 2011, 12:35 p.m.]

Photo of Lobsang Dhargye, a monk of Kirti Monastery who was detained by the Chinese authorities on 12 April 2011

DHARAMSHALA:
The Offices of Tibet in Australia and Belgium have appealed for
assistance from their host countries to persuade the Chinese government
to end the military blockade of Kirti Monastery in Ngaba in
northeastern Tibet.His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s Representative
to Australia, Mr Sonam N Dagpo, had called on Senator Bob Brown to urge
Prime Minister Julia Gillard and Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd to
persuade Chinese authorities to ease the restrictions on the monastery.
“Australian Greens Leader Bob Brown has written to Foreign
Minister Kevin Rudd to ask Australia to make urgent representations to
China after the military blockade of the Kirti monastery in Tibet,” The
Australian Greens said in a press release issued on 14 April.”China’s
military crackdown follows the suicide protest of a monk last month to
mark the anniversary of protests which saw at least 10 people killed at
the monastery in 2008,” Senator Brown said.”The local Tibetan
community is greatly alarmed by what is happening and has reported that
the Chinese military has barricaded the monks and are restricting food
supplies going in and out of the monastery. Some Tibetan groups have
expressed grave concerns that monks and their supporters may be
indefinitely detained, or worse, killed,” he added.In response
to an appeal from the Office of Tibet in Brussels, Mr Fiorello Provera,
Member of European Parliament (MEP) and Vice-Chair of the Foreign
Affairs Committee, has written to High Representative Catherine Ashton
expressing his concern about the deteriorating situation at Kirti
Monastery and calling on the EU to take a firm stance. In
addition to some 30 MEPs, the office of Tibet has also written to the
Deputy Secretary General of the European External Action Service of the
Commission and the Belgian Foreign Ministry.Meanwhile, a rights
group based in Washington, DC which monitors situation inside Tibet
reported yesterday that even though lay people were allowed to deliver
food to Kirti monastery, it is still under lockdown and surrounded by
armed troops.The International Campaign for Tibet also reported
that around 34 Tibetans were detained in Ngaba during the crackdown
against monks and the lay community at Kirti monastery over the past
few weeks.