Czech Green Deputies Show Support For Tibetans' Nonviolent Struggle

Thursday, March 11 2010 @ 04:33 pm GMT

The Greens say they want to demonstrate their support to all nations
and groups whose rights are suppressed. (ČTK)

Dharamshala: The Czech Green (SZ) deputies on Wednesday expressed support for Tibetans in their non-violent efforts on the occasion of the 51st Tibetan National Uprising Day. The deputies hoisted the Tibetan flag from the window of their group's office in the Chamber of Deputies to support, Prague Monitor reported.

The Greens also placed Tibetan flags on their benches in the lower house. They want to demonstrate their support to all nations and groups whose rights are suppressed.

"This is no insistence on Tibet's independence, but support to Tibetans in their effort to observe their civic and human rights," Environment Minister Jan Dusik said. Mr Dusik, nominated by the Greens, also hoisted the Tibetan flag outside the office at 08:00 a.m. The flag was there for thirty minutes until he left the building.

Former Greens leader Martin Bursik read a six-point declaration when the programme of the lower house session was being arranged.

The resolution says the situation in Tibet has not changed over the past two years and Chinese authorities still violate Tibetans' rights, Bursik said.

"The Chamber of Deputies condemns the executions of Tibetans, Uygurs and Chinese that have occurred in the past months and it calls on the authorities of the People's Republic of China to stop using any violence," Bursik read.

"We devote persistent, continued effort to human rights. Moreover, the day associated with human rights and their defence relates not only to Tibetans, but to all cultures of nations and groups of people whose rights are curtailed," Greens leader Ondrej Liska said.

"This is no PR event, but a question of championing the principles on which some arrangement is based and to which this state does not sufficiently adhere," Liska said.

Liska said the flag had been hoisted from the lower house window to make it clear that this was a campaign by the Greens, not the Chamber of Deputies. As a result, the Greens will not remove it even if asked by the Chamber of Deputies leadership.

The Tibetan flag was also hoisted by Vlastimil Sehnal (Civic Democratic Party, ODS), chairman of the Senate commission for the support to democracy in the world, from the window of his office in the Senate building.

Sehnal said he mainly wanted to highlight Tibetans' oppression by the Chinese regime.

Sehnal said he was not troubled by the expected protests of the Chinese embassy.

"Let the Chinese protest," Sehnal said, adding that all Chinese goods in the Czech Republic and the EU should be labelled: "Produced in China in concentration camps in which innocent people are imprisoned."

Sehnal said the commission was drafting a declaration against the practices of the Chinese regime.

"We want the Senate to pass a resolution resolutely protesting against imprisonment without a trial," Sehnal said, adding that three to five million people were being detained in Chinese concentration camps without any sentence.

Tibetan flags were hoisted by many town halls and regional offices across the nation Wednesday.

Last year, over 350 town halls and two ministries joined the campaign.

Amnesty International projected a document by an imprisoned Tibetan filmmaker outside the Chinese embassy in Prague at 18:00 Wednesday.

source tibet.net