China has deported an Australian activist and his American colleague after they campaigned for an improvement in human rights in Tibet by unfurling a banner in Beijing, it was reported today.
The banner called for the 2008 Olympics not to be held in the city.
A colleague of the two, Alison Reynolds of the International Tibet Support Network, said the two were taken to Beijing airport and were set to fly to Hong Kong.
Australian Liam Phelan, 33, and US citizen Han Shan, 31, were detained yesterday after holding up a banner on a bridge near where the Olympic stadium is being built that read in English: “No Olympics for China until Tibet is free”.
Reynolds said it appeared the two men had not been been charged but she did not know if they were being formally expelled, which would mean they could not return to China for five years.
“They had to write self criticisms,” she said. “As far as I know, there were no official charges or fines.”
Chinese troops occupied Tibet in 1950 and Beijing considers the Himalayan region part of its territory.
Tibet’s spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, fled to India in 1959 from where he leads a government in exile which is trying to win more autonomy for the region.
Many overseas Tibetans and their foreign supporters say Chinese authorities in Tibet have a poor human rights record.
China denies rights abuses.
At an unlikely news conference in Beijing yesterday, representatives of overseas groups that support calls for autonomy in Tibet said the International Olympic Committee should tell China its right to host the games would be revoked if there was no improvement in its rights’ record.
