NEW DELHI, Jan 10 (AFP) - A 59-year-old Tibetan woman on Friday issued a plea to see her only son jailed in China on charges of spying for the Dalai Lama.

"I request the governments of the world and the international community to prevail upon the Chinese government to allow me to visit my son in prison before I die," Sonam Dekyi told reporters here.

Dekyi denied that her son, Ngawang Choephel, was on a spying mission when he went missing in Tibet in August 1995.

Chinese authorities admitted to holding him in October last year, saying he was spying for the Dalai Lama's government-in-exile while pretending to make a documentary on traditional Tibetan music and culture.

"It is ridiculous," the mother said. "I am worried that after inflicting severe torture, they might have forced my son to confess."

Choephel, 30, was in December sentenced to 18 years in prison by a Chinese court. Choephel, who completed his early education in India, was a Fulbright scholar at Vermont in the United States.

Two Tibetan groups which organised Dekyi's press conference said more than 800 known Tibetan political activists were in Chinese prisons in Tibet.

The Dalai Lama's government-in-exile is based in the Indian hill town of Dharamsala. It is not recognised by any country. India is also home to about 100,000 Tibetan exiles.