DHARAMSHALA, March 19: A Tibetan man aged 24 years has reportedly set himself ablaze in Nyarong in the traditional Tibetan province of Kham on Saturday, taking the toll of Tibetan self immolations to 147 since 2009.
According to the official website of the exile Tibetan government (known officially as the Central Tibetan Administration), Pema Gyaltsen, known among his friends and family as Pegyal, self immolated near Tsokha Monastery in Nyarong around 4 PM on March 18, 2017.
The Chinese police on patrol immediately arrived at the scene and took the charred body of Pegyal. A video taken by a bystander of Pegyal’s self immolation protest has appeared on the Internet and is being circulated in social networking sites.
It is not known if Pegyal has succumbed to the burns or is still alive. His current whereabouts remain unknown.
Pegyal’s self immolation marks the second such protest by a Tibetan in Nyarong. 18-year-old Kalsang Wangdu, a monk of Retsokha Aryaling monastery, self immolated in a protest near his monastery in Nyarong on February 29, 2016 (leap year). The same day saw another self immolation by an exile Tibetan schoolboy named Dorjee Tsering in Herbertpur.
