[07. November 2011] BBC

It was just a few minutes to one in the afternoon last Thursday. Standing at a road junction in a town in Sichuan, in south-western China, was a young woman. Without warning, she doused herself in petrol - she may even have drunk some - and then set fire to herself.

Tibetans say her name was Palden Choetso; she was 35 years old and had been a Tibetan Buddhist nun since the age of 20. Official Chinese reports gave her name in Chinese as Qiu Xiang. Her death, it is thought, was swift and, one can only imagine, agonising.

So what drives someone to such an awful, desperate step? In fact, what drives 11 people to willingly burn themselves like this? Read more