By Phurbu Thinley

Dharamsala, June 17: One Tibetan suffered gun shot and three others were seriously wounded in Chamdo in eastern Tibet during a drive against an ongoing farming boycott campaign in the area towards the end of last month, sources said.

During the crackdown, a man identified as Tsering was hit by a bullet, and two others, Paga and Lhadar, were taken away after being severely beaten and injured by Chinese police with baton. Another Tibetan named Samga was also beaten with rifle butts.

All these incidents took place in Jomda County in Chamdo Prefecture of Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) in the end of May, sources informed relevant department of Tibet’s Government in exile based in Dharamsala, India.

Sources said Chinese security forces also arrested protesters, including staff members of Vara and Jobhu monasteries in Jomda County during the crackdown.

According to the sources; except three people, all other detainees were later released. The three detainees identified as Sonam Palmo (alias Sopal), Lobsang Palden and Yeshe Dorjee were being held accountable as the leaders of the May farming boycott campaign, the sources said.

The sources also said several retreat lamas of two other monasteries in the area were also severely beaten by Chinese security forces during night raids.

Gyune monastery was under siege, encircled by armed forces, and eight of its resident retreat lamas were beaten during a night raid. Retreat lamas of the Palchen monastery were also beaten, sources informed the exile Tibetan government.

Similar “Farming Boycott Movement” also took place in several areas in Kardze (Ch: Ganzi) prefecture in Sichuan province since March this year.

The Dharamsala-based Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy (TCHRD) says the symbolic civil disobedience movement were led by the residents of the areas to challenge the “prevalent repressive policies being initiated and implemented by the Chinese authorities against the Tibetans.”

The centre also reported at the time that the Chinese authorities had issued notices warning Tibetan farmers of serious consequences or even confiscation of lands of any one who refused to do farming.

Chinese authorities in Kardze later reportedly went on an “arrest and beating drive” against farmers who continued to defy authorities' order to till their farmlands.

According to TCHRD, many of the Tibetan youths in Kardze were arrested and detained by Chinese authorities after taking part in anti-China protests last year. “Even if people in Kardze wishes to till the lands, there is hardly any manpower left behind to do the farming work,” the centre said in a statement.

Anti-China unrest last year spread to the Tibetan regions in three other provinces outside of the Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR) — Sichuan, Gansu and Qinghai — and was the most sustained and widespread Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule in decades.