Group Says China Has Executed 4 for Roles in Tibet Riots - NYTimes.com

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By ANDREW JACOBS

BEIJING — A Tibetan exile group in India says that the Chinese authorities have executed four people convicted for their roles in the riots that convulsed Tibet last year.

According to the Tibetan Center for Human Rights and Democracy, the four were put to death on Tuesday, more than six months after they were tried and convicted of starting fires in the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, that killed seven people.

At least 18 people died in March 2008 during violence that was directed at Han Chinese migrants, whose growing presence in the region has angered many native Tibetans. Since then at least 84 people have been convicted during trials that rights groups say are opaque, cursory and unfair.

The executions were not announced by the Chinese news media, and a woman who answered the phone at the Lhasa Municipal Intermediate People’s Court hung up when asked to confirm the accounts provided by the exile group.

The executions come at a time of deteriorating relations between China and representatives of the Dalai Lama, the exiled spiritual leader who has been trying to negotiate greater autonomy for Tibetans. This week Chinese officials angrily denounced his planned visit to a Buddhist area of India that China claims as its own. China views the Dalai Lama, who fled to India three decades ago, as an instigator of Tibetan separatism.

Although they claim that Tibetans are sometimes secretly killed in detention, exile groups say the executions this week were the first in Tibet since 2002. They identified three of those killed as Lobsang Gyaltsen and Loyak, both men, and a woman named Penkyi.

Tashi Choephel, a researcher at the center, said he was unable to confirm the identity of the fourth. “It is extremely difficult to get any news out of Tibet, and those who provide information do so at great risk to their own lives,” he said, speaking from Dharamsala, India.

In announcing the convictions in April, the state-run news agency Xinhua said the accused had set fire to downtown clothing stores, killing employees who were cowering inside. “These arsons were among the worst crimes,” according to a court official quoted at the time.

“They led to extremely serious consequences, resulted in great loss of life and property and severely undermined social order, security and stability.”

In an effort to maintain order since the riots, the authorities have intensified their grip on daily life in Tibet and imposed greater restrictions on Buddhist monks and nuns, many of whom were at the center of the initial protests that turned violent.

According to the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, which released a report on Thursday that documents the crackdown, at least 670 Tibetans have been jailed in 2009 for activities that include peaceful protest or leaking information to the outside world.

The report detailed a widespread “patriotic education” campaign that requires monks and nuns to pass examinations on political texts, agree that Tibet is historically a part of China and denounce the Dalai Lama.

“The government has in the past year used institutional, educational, legal and propaganda channels to pressure Tibetan Buddhists to modify their religious views and aspirations,” the report said.