05 April 2011

China has intensified its crackdown on religious and political freedom in eastern Tibet in the wake of a protest sparked by the self-immolation of a monk from Kirti Monastery in Ngaba (Chinese: Aba county in Sichuan province) on 16 March. An indefinite ban on religious activities has been imposed at the monastery, a stronghold of Tibetan resistance in 2008. Dozens of Tibetans have been arrested in relation to the protest.

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The repression in Tibet coincides with the harshest crackdown on free expression in China in recent years. As calls for a Chinese ‘Jasmine Revolution’ began to circulate online in recent weeks, the Chinese government has honed in on a number of writers, lawyers and activists for ‘subverting state power’. Chinese-Australian political blogger Yang Hengjun disappeared in Guangzhou last week only to resurface few days later to say he has been in hospital and world-renowned artist and dissident Ai Weiwei was detained at Beijing airport over the weekend.

According to Chinese Human Rights Defenders, the government has “criminally detained 26 individuals, disappeared more than 30 and put more than 200 under soft detention” since mid-February.