China responsible for self-immolations: Sangay

Tibetan prime minister-in-exile Lobsang Sangay today held China responsible for the ongoing wave of self-immolations in Tibet, maintaining that the exiled community's spiritual leader Dalai Lama and Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) had always discouraged such drastic action.

"The Dalai Lama and CTA have always discouraged such drastic actions. However, despite our pleas, Tibetans continue to self-immolate, with 14 cases already reported in 2012," Sangay said while addressing a function to mark the 53rd anniversary of Tibetan National Uprising Day at Tsuglakhang Temple here.

Sangay said that the blame for the growing number of immolations by monks, nuns and lay people lies squarely with the hardliner leaders in Beijing and so does the solution.

"The self-immolations are an emphatic rejection of empty promises of so-called 'socialist paradise'," Sangay said.

Asserting that the Tibetan struggle was not against the Chinese or China as a nation, Sangay said the struggle was against hard-line policies of the communist regime and China must acknowledge the depth of Tibet problem and understand that it cannot be solved through violence.

Giving an overview of the situation in Tibet, Sangay said that Tibet was under undeclared martial law and there was no space for conventional protests such as hunger strikes, demonstrations and even peaceful gatherings.

"Tibetans are therefore taking extreme actions such as the one by 26 Tibetans who have committed self-immolations since 2009," Sangay said adding that Tibetans, including monks and nuns, were forced to denounce the Dalai Lama and attend patriotic re-education classes while foreigners and international media were barred from Tibetan areas.

He also extended support to the Dalai Lama's September 24, 2011, statement on his reincarnation.

"His Holiness, the Dalai Lama, alone has the right to determine his reincarnation, and that the communist government of China has absolutely no say or role in this matter," said Sangay.