DHARAMSHALA, August 5: With the ongoing wave of self-immolations in
Tibet threatening to spread all over the plateau, Chinese security
personnel have come up with specially designed tools to take down and
overpower the self-immolators. Recent pictures taken in Lhasa,
the ancient capital city of Tibet, show poles of different lengths that
have either hooks or round metal rings of different sizes at one end. The
pictures released by Beijing-based Tibetan writer Woeser on a social
networking site have reportedly been taken by Chinese tourists in July
and August. A close look at the pictures makes one realise that
the hooks are designed to catch a self-immolator and the the round metal
rings are meant for either holding the self-immolator’s burning body by
the waist, by the neck or by the feet, depending on the size of the
ring.
These new tools can be seen abundantly lying around Lhasa city along
with fire extinguishers, outside police stations, and also being paraded
by marching security personnel on the city streets. Calling
these new tools “Police Forks,” Woeser notes that security personnel all
over Tibet have been armed with these “new weapons.” In one of
the picture, the police forks can be seen outside the Barkhor police
station, opposite the Jokhang Temple, the site of the May 27 twin
self-immolation protests by Dhargey, 25 and Dorjee Tseten, 19. Chinese brutality, specially against Tibetan self-immolators, are not new. Foreign
journalists who were able to gain access to Ngaba, the eastern Tibet
region at the centre of the self-immolation protests, had earlier
reported that Chinese security personnel were using “spiked batons” to
overpower self-immolators. One of the first international journalists to gain access to Ngaba, Jonathan Watts of the Guardian newspaper in March reported
that Chinese paramilitaries were trying to “snuff out Tibetan
resistance to Beijing's rule with spiked batons, semi-automatic weapons
and fire extinguishers.” A dramatic video footage
shot on January 14 of the self-immolation protest by Losang Jamyang,
22, a former monk at the Andu monastery in Ngaba, shows Chinese security
personnel mercilessly knocking down and kicking him while his body is
still on fire.
There have been several other reports of similar instances where
Chinese security forces have shot, brutally beaten, and maimed Tibetan
self-immolators. Since 2009, the ongoing wave of self-immolations
has witnessed 45 Tibetans set themselves on fire demanding freedom in
Tibet and the return of Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama from
exile.
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