Dharamsala, Oct 27: China on Tuesday confirmed it executed two Tibetans for their alleged involvement in last year’s anti-China unrest in Lhasa, according to media reports.
Chinese foreign ministry spokesman, Ma Zhaoxu, said two men had been put to death, but declined to give any details about the executions.
The confirmation comes a week after exile Tibetan groups said Chinese authorities executed at least four Tibetans in Lhasa on Oct 20.
Tibetan Government-in-Exile and Dharamsala-based Tibetan Centre for Human Rights (TCHRD), last week said they had confirmed information that Lobsang Gyaltsen, 27, from Lhasa, Loyak, 25, of Tashi Khang, Shol Township, Lhasa, Penkyi, a 21-year old girl from Sakya County and an unidentified Tibetan were executed in Lhasa on Oct 20.
“The procedural rights of the defendants were fully ensured,” Reuters quoted Ma as saying during a regular news conference in Beijing. “The two criminals who were executed had strictly conducted first and second trials and the Supreme People’s Court examined and ratified the sentences.”
Some overseas Tibetan groups have identified the dead as Lobsang Gyaltsen and Loyak.
Lobsang Gyaltsen was sentenced to death this year for an arson attack that killed a shop owner in Lhasa, according to a report in April by Xinhua news agency. Loyak was handed the same penalty for starting a blaze at a motorcycle shop that killed five people, the agency said.
The US-funded Radio Free Asia said Lobsang Gyaltsen was allowed a visit by his mother before he was executed. “I have nothing to say, except please take good care of my child and send him to school,” he was quoted as telling her.
