World Tibet Network News Tuesday, April 28, 1998 (II)

by Pratap Chakravarty

NEW DELHI, April 28 (AFP) - Tibetan exiles Tuesday defiantly renewed a hunger strike broken up by Indian police as doctors gave up hope of reviving another protester who set himself on fire in protest at the crackdown.

"Our hunger strike has begun again," a Tibetan Youth Congress (TYC) spokesman announced from an old observatory in New Delhi, where the almost 50-day fast against Chinese rule of Tibet was stopped by police on Monday.

The 50-year-old Tibetan who set himself on fire when police forcibly moved the hunger strikers to hospital was close to death, doctors said.

Doctors treating Thupten Ngodub said the Tibetan with 100 percent burns had almost no chance of surviving.

"The chances are very poor," said Ved Bhushan, chief of the Ram Manohar Lohia hospital where the Tibetan is being treated.

Another physician said: "His chances of survival are remote despite all the life support systems we have put him on... We are also losing hope."

The doctor said Ngodub, a former soldier of an Tibetan arm of the Indian army, was steadily weakening.

The hospital was flooded with telephone calls from wellwishers from across the world.

TYC spokesman Choekyong Wangchuk said the renewed hunger strike by six Tibetans, each representing one million of Tibet's six million people, began at one minute past midnight Tuesday (1831 GMT Monday). Six other Tibetans had fasted since March 10 before being forcibly taken to hospital on Sunday and Monday.

"We will not give up until our demands are met," he said of their campaign to end Chinese rule of Tibet.

The TYC said hundreds of Tibetans were ready to take the place of the six currently on a fast.

"If they are taken away then another six will replace them... The police should know that it is a futile exercise," said Wangchuk, one of the top leaders of the TYC.

A militant section of the TYC, which has thousands of members, has often differed over anti-Chinese strategy with Tibet's spiritual leader the Dalai Lama. The section says it does not believe in absolute non-violence.

Wangchuk said some of the hunger strikers taken to hospital promised they would renew their fast when they were released.

"...They are determined to restart their fast," he said.

Nobel laureate the Dalai Lama, who had visited the hunger strikers earlier, was expected in Delhi later Tuesday and Wangchuk said he may visit Ngodub in hospital.

The police have restricted visitors to the ward where Ngodub is being treated under heavy guard.

Police fear Tibetan protests could swell with similar suicide attempts if Ngodub dies.

"Ngodub is the first Tibetan to do an act like this, and in case he dies then he would be revered by coming generations of Tibetans," Wangchuk said.

"There will be a grand funeral and people from everywhere will come."

On Tuesday the police withdrew from the scene of the hunger strike to prevent a confrontation, officials said.

India has described Ngodub's self-immolation as "unfortunate and regrettable" but declined to explain why the protest was broken up during the visit of the Chinese army chief, General Fu Quanyou, who arrived Sunday.

The protesters claimed the authorities forced them to abandon the strike to appease Beijing during Fu's visit, the first to India by a Chinese army chief.

Chinese troops marched into Tibet in 1951. More than 100,000 Tibetan refugees live in India.

The Dalai Lama has lived in the northern Indian town of Dharamsala since fleeing his homeland in 1959 following a failed anti-China uprising.