TIBET Reuter: Rioting monks fought hand to hand with Tibetian police in a wild demonstration against Chinese rule that ended with at least six deaths, witnesses reported from Lhasa on Saturday.
Two Americans who saw Thursday’s riots in the Tibetan capital said the corpse of one victim was carried over the heads of a crowd which later came under a police charge.
Reuter correspondent Guy Dinmore reported from Lhasa that the police opened fire on the crowd, killing at least six people and wounding many others. Nineteen policemen were reported seriously injured.
In New Delhi, the Dalai Lama spintual leader of the Tibetans called on the Chinese government to halt what he described as the execution and imprisonment of his people.
The Lhasa demonstration was described there as the bloodiest protest against Chinese rule in the Tibet since an abortive uprising in 1959, when the Dalai Lama was forced to flee into exile in India.
The two Americans who witnessed the riots spoke in Kathmandu about pitched battles between police and Buddhist monks.
One of the duo, who asked not to be identified, said he was detained for a time at a police station which was later burned to the ground by enraged monks and other demonstrators demanding independence for Tibet.
Earlier, he said, “A large group of officers entered the police station, dragging along with them several dozen monks and laymen.
“The police were extremely violent in their efforts to subdue the monks. One plainclothesman came into the office where I was being detained and grabbed a shovel. I saw him beat a monk to the ground with it”.
Western witnesses in Lhasa said the rioting erupted outside the Jokhang temple after police seized 50 monks and laymen staging a march for national independence.
In Peking, Tibetan students said they were stunned by the separatist riots and argued that only a minority of their fellow countrymen wanted independence from China.
Article extracted from this publication >> October 9, 1987
