Young monk arrested after solitary protest in Ngaba County

DHARAMSALA, April 28: A young Tibetan monk was arrested in restive Ngaba County in the traditional Tibetan Province of Amdo for carrying out a solitary protest against Chinese rule in Tibet.

Wearing a hand-drawn Tibetan national flag around his head and carrying a large portrait of the Tibetan spiritual leader, His Holiness, the Dalai Lama, Lobsang Tenpa, a 19-yr-old monk of Kirti monastery on April 26 shouted slogans while protesting on the main street in Ngaba County.

Lobsang Tenpa during his solitary protest in Ngaba.
Lobsang Tenpa during his solitary protest in Ngaba.

“Within minutes of Lobsang’s solitary protest against long-held repressive Chinese policies in Tibet, County police on patrol in the area arrested him and took him away” said sources at Dharamsala-based Kirti monastery.

The exact content of slogans raised by Lobsang and his whereabouts could not be ascertained immediately.

Lobsang Tempa, a native of Village No. 2 in Meuruma Township in Ngaba County is the son of Ngagchung and Dolma Choeko. He had joined Kirti monastery at a young age and was studying in the ninth standard of the monastic school at the time of his arrest.

Since pan-Tibet protests in 2008, Ngaba County has been a hot bed for Tibetan protests, including self-immolations and is still reeling under tension with hundreds of paramilitary forces and other special security forces deployed in the area. With the security forces flashing their weapons and surveillance equipment everywhere, Tibetans in Ngaba are said to be living under an atmosphere of fear.

 

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