(RSF/IFEX) – On the eve of an official visit to China by French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin, RSF has reminded him of the serious press freedom violations in the country. In particular, the organisation urged him to press the Chinese authorities to release five Tibetan monks who were recently sentenced to “reeducation through work” for […]
(RSF/IFEX) – On the eve of an official visit to China by French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin, RSF has reminded him of the serious press freedom violations in the country. In particular, the organisation urged him to press the Chinese authorities to release five Tibetan monks who were recently sentenced to “reeducation through work” for publishing a journal.
“The implementation of economic and scientific partnership between France and China should not obscure the Beijing government’s repressive policies as regards free expression,” RSF said in a letter to Raffarin. “We believe that, as part of its dialogue with the Chinese authorities, France should press for the release of prisoners of conscience or, at the very least, for an improvement in their prison conditions,” the organisation added.
RSF asked Raffarin to press for the release of Tashi Gyaltsen, Lobsang Dhargay, Thoe Samden, Tsultrim Phelgay and Jampel Gyatso, of Tibet’s Drakar Trezong monastery, who were arrested on 16 January 2005. Three weeks later, the monks were sentenced to terms of two to three years of “reeducation through work”. They are serving their sentences in a Qinghai labour camp, near Xining (north central China). The monks were detained for publishing a journal containing poems and articles of a political nature.
