| | |  Americas & Beyond | March 2009 
Crowds Protest Around World for Freedom in Tibet
 The Associated Press
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| | A woman wearing a Tibetan flag raises her fist. (Getty Images) | |
New York - Tibetans and their supporters marched through the city and elsewhere Tuesday, saying they wanted to speak up for a silenced people on the 50th anniversary of the failed uprising that forced the Dalai Lama into exile.
Carrying a portrait of the Tibetan spiritual leader and chanting such slogans as "we want free Tibet," more than 1,000 protesters followed a more than eight-mile route and rallied near the United Nations and the Chinese Consulate.
They were among demonstrators around the world marking the anniversaries of both the 1959 uprising against Chinese rule and a commemoration that turned violent in Tibet last year, widening the rift between Tibetans and Chinese officials. Chinese troops poured into the region to quell any protests there this year.
"Tibetan people are suffering enormously, and it is the responsibility of Tibetans outside, in the free world, to speak up for Tibet," Tibetan-born demonstrator Tashi Sharjang, 51, of Howell, N.J., said in New York. "We are hoping for the world to pay more attention to Tibet."
Organizers estimated 1,000 to 3,000 people joined the column of protesters who threaded their way across the Brooklyn Bridge and through Times Square, some in the crimson robes of Buddhist monks.
They called out "shame on China" as they converged near the nation's consulate, waving Tibetan flags and banners that celebrated "50 years of resistance."
Consulate spokesman Wenqi Gao said officials had taken security precautions but had no other response to the protests.
Hundreds of pro-Tibetan activists also gathered outside the Chinese Consulate in San Francisco, carrying signs and chanting, "Long Live the Dalai Lama."
The protesters called on Chinese authorities to respect human rights in Tibet and to release Tibetan political prisoners, said 55-year-old Ngodup Tsering, who left Tibet for India with his family in 1959.
He said he would like to return one day to "see Tibetans free, as free people in their own land."
In India, thousands of young Tibetans marched through the streets in Dharmsala, the town where the Dalai Lama set up his base after fleeing Tibet.
The spiritual leader, now 73, told followers there that Chinese rulers were treating his people "like criminals deserving to be put to death." In unusually harsh language, he said they have pushed Tibetan culture and identity almost to extinction and "brought untold suffering to the land and people of Tibet."
In Nepal, home to thousands of Tibetan exiles, police blocked about 100 Tibetans who demonstrated on the outskirts of the capital Katmandu chanting "Stop killing in Tibet! Free Tibet!"
Similar protests were held Tuesday across Europe and the Asia-Pacific region.
In Canberra, the Australian capital, a handful of protesters scuffled with police outside the Chinese Embassy after about 300 had marched from Parliament House.
Police arrested four people after they broke through temporary fencing bordering a designated protest area, police said. The phone at the press office in the Chinese Embassy in Canberra rang unanswered Tuesday.
A couple of hundred pro-Tibet demonstrators marched down Paris' fashionable Avenue George V, and more than 100 protesters marched near London's Houses of Parliament, some dressed in monk outfits or bright traditional Tibetan dresses.
"I could say 'freedom for Tibet' here, but a Tibetan person could be imprisoned and tortured for that," said Julie Speechley, one of the London protesters.
In Germany, Green Party lawmaker Volker Beck called on world leaders to encourage China to resume dialogue with the Dalai Lama. A small group of demonstrators gathered outside the Chinese Embassy in Berlin.
Some 80 people lit white candles in front of the Chinese Embassy in Warsaw, Poland.
Associated Press writers Audra Ang in Ya'an, China; Rod McGuirk in Canberra, Australia; Laura Nichols in London; Gavin Rabinowitz in Dharmsala, India; and Deborah Seward in Paris contributed to this report. |
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