Police Reportedly Shoot, Kill 3 Anti-Chinese Protesters in Tibet

Police opened fire Saturday on anti-Chinese protesters in Lhasa, apparently killing at least three demonstrators and injuring a foreign tourist, Westerners in the Tibetan capital said.

The pro-independence protest outside central Lhasa’s Jokhang Temple was timed to coincide with worldwide celebrations marking the 40th anniversary of the U.N. Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It was the third such protest in little more than a year to be suppressed with bloodshed.

“About 30 Tibetans walked into the marketplace near the temple at around 11:30 a.m.,” Lucia Dezries, a Dutch tourist, said in a telephone interview with a reporter in Beijing. “They were walking in twos. The first man was holding a Tibetan flag. A crowd in the marketplace began to encourage them. Then the soldiers began shooting.”

The man holding the Tibetan flag, who apparently was a Buddhist monk, was killed by one of the first shots, according to an American tourist in Lhasa who spoke by telephone with a reporter in Beijing. A Tibetan woman and a young man also were killed by police gunshots, he said.

The crowd of Tibetans that gathered during the demonstration threw rocks at the security officers, who probably were “people’s armed police” in uniforms that tourists easily mistake for army clothes. It was not clear whether the rock throwing or the shooting came first, Dezries said.

Chinese authorities in Lhasa, apparently aware that protests were being planned, recently issued warnings that demonstrators would be shot, according to reports reaching Beijing after the incident.

Dezries and the American tourist both said that a young Dutch woman was hospitalized with a gunshot wound to her arm. Dezries said she saw two Tibetans lying in pools of blood, and two others with what appeared to be bullet wounds to their legs.

Various Westerners and Tibetans in Lhasa, speaking by telephone with reporters in Beijing, said two or three were killed and up to a dozen injured.

Most of the demonstrators were wearing ordinary clothes, but many of those who initiated the protest apparently were monks from two nearby monasteries. Pro-independence protests in Tibet--which has been under Chinese control since 1951--have been spearheaded by monks loyal to the Dalai Lama, the region’s former theocratic ruler who now lives in exile in India.

After the initial gunshots, police used tear gas to clear the streets in the temple area, witnesses said. The rest of the city apparently remained calm.

The official New China News Agency carried confirmation late Saturday that a demonstration had been suppressed but offered only limited details.

The agency, in its brief report, said that a group of monks and nuns had “started a riot in Lhasa.”

The protesters walked through Lhasa to the Jokhang Temple, picking up additional supporters on the way, the agency reported.

“Some of them were seen waving flags in support of the independence of Tibet,” it said. “As the crowd grew unruly, policemen on duty began to take measures to stop the marchers, who were later dispersed.

“Leaflets advocating the independence of Tibet were found on the streets,” it added. The agency did not report any shootings, casualties or deaths.

At least six and perhaps as many as 14 people died when police crushed an anti-Chinese riot in Lhasa on Oct. 1, 1987. Similar rioting last March 5 left at least eight people dead, with some reports placing the number at 24.

The latest rioting took place as China and the Dalai Lama are exploring the possibility of opening negotiations. The Dalai Lama has said he could accept Chinese control of Tibet’s foreign affairs if Tibet had genuine self-rule. China has said the Dalai Lama is welcome to return but only if he stops advocating Tibetan independence.

The Panchen Lama, Tibet’s No. 2 religious leader, is involved in contacts between China and the Dalai Lama. View, Part Two.