PEKING, JUNE 2, REUTER — Chinese law enforcement officials working in Tibet have been ordered not to use torture to extract confessions, the official Tibet Daily reported.
The ban on torture was one of “seven prohibitions” issued by the Lhasa City Justice Committee to legal officials and police in the remote Himalayan mountain region.
“Do not beat or curse the masses. Do not eat or drink with: out paying, do not get drunk. Do not play with women. Do not abuses police equipment? Do not use torture to extract confessions. Do not misuse the law for your own ends,” the list read.
The May 20 edition of the Tibet Daily, which arrived in Peking on Thursday, said the new regulations were issued because “the quality of political tasks has not kept up with the developing situation.”
Tibetans and western doctors in Lhasa have alleged that prison authorities’ torture people who were arrested after anti-Chinese rioting exploded in the regional capital last October.
Tibetans described how people were given almost nothing to eat, beaten in prison and forced to bend over with heavy weights hung from their necks.
There has been no independent confirmation of their accusations and Chinese officials have denied the charges.
The Tibet Daily did not say that torture had actually taken place. It praised law enforcement Officials for their work, saying they were trusted by the people and the communist party.
Six Tibetans were killed in the October rioting and five more, including one policeman, died in renewed violence in March, according to official accounts.
Article extracted from this publication >> June 10, 1988
