Updated at 03:00 p.m.EST on 2016-08-05
A Tibetan monk missing since his detention by police last year following a solo protest in southwestern China’s Sichuan province has been located by family members at a prison in Ngaba prefecture, where he is serving a three-year term, sources said.
Adrak, also known as Lobsang Drakpa, had been tried and sentenced in a secret hearing, a local source told RFA’s Tibetan Service, in the third jailing of a solitary protester to be reported from inside Tibetan areas of China in the last two weeks.
“His family members were not informed, but after a long search they finally learned that he had been given a three-year sentence,” the source said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“He is now being held in a prison in Maowun [in Chinese, Mao] county, and his family members are not allowed to see him,” he said.
“No information is available about his current condition,” he added.
Adrak, a monk of Ngaba’s Kirti monastery, staged his protest in the main town of the prefecture’s Ngaba (in Chinese, Aba) county on Sept. 10, 2015, calling loudly for Tibetan freedom before he was overpowered by police and taken away, sources told RFA in earlier reports.
“Local Tibetans who witnessed the scene raised cries in his support,” one source said.
Sporadic demonstrations challenging Beijing’s rule have continued in Tibetan-populated areas of China since widespread protests swept the region in 2008.
A total of 145 Tibetans living in China have also set themselves ablaze in self-immolations since the wave of fiery protests began in 2009, with most protests featuring calls for Tibetan freedom and the return from India of Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader the Dalai Lama.
Reported by Kunsang Tenzin for RFA’s Tibetan Service. Translated by Karma Dorjee. Written in English by Richard Finney.
CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story gave an incorrect location for the prison in which Adrak is being held.