Tibetan Student Burns Himself to Death in Protest
BEIJING — A Tibetan student burned himself to death last week in protest of Chinese rule in the first self-immolation in five months, an international human rights organization reported Monday.
The student, Lhamo Tashi, 22, set himself on fire in front of a police station in the western province of Gansu on Wednesday. Although family members requested his body, the police confiscated and cremated it, only returning his ashes two days later, according to a report by Free Tibet, an advocacy group based in London.
Radio Free Asia, which is financed by the U.S. government, said that news of the self-immolation had not spread until the weekend because of “communication clampdowns usually imposed by Chinese authorities’’ after such protests occur.
As he set himself alight, Tashi shouted slogans in front of a police station in Tsoe County, also known as Hezuo in Mandarin, before dying of his injuries, the news organization said, citing local sources.
At least 132 Tibetans have self-immolated since 2009 to protest Chinese rule over Tibetan areas and call for the return of the Dalai Lama, the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader.
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