Trading fireworks for somber prayer, Tibetans marked Wednesday's arrival of their new year with mourning as Chinese authorities sealed off Tibet and Tibetan regions in western China to foreigners.
An unofficial Tibetan boycott of festivities was in memory of last year's victims of a harsh Chinese crackdown on anti-government protests. The Dalai Lama, Tibet's spiritual leader, said celebrations would be "inappropriate."
At temples in Tibet's capital of Lhasa, rifle-toting Chinese paramilitary guards replaced crowds of pilgrims, and candlelight vigils were held instead of the usual merrymaking, Tibetan groups said.
"The Chinese government is flooding Tibet with troops and attempting to force Tibetans to celebrate the New Year against their will but, in spite of incredible risks to themselves, Tibetans remain defiant," Lhadon Tethong, executive director of Students for a Free Tibet, said in an e-mail.
Adding to the tensions, next month marks the 50th anniversary of a failed 1959 uprising against Chinese rule that led to the Dalai Lama's flight into exile.
This incident on the same day is, of course, a mystery:
A passenger car at an intersection near Beijing's Tiananmen Square caught fire Wednesday with three people inside, police said, in what may have been a desperate attempt to draw attention to personal grievances.
The official Xinhua News Agency said there were two men and a woman inside the car when it was approached by police and a fire broke out. A man and a woman, a couple, were taken to a hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, the agency reported, without saying what happened to the second man.
The people in the car had come to the Chinese capital to seek help with "personal problems," the police statement said. It did not elaborate, but petitioners seeking redress for problems with local officials have begun flocking to the Chinese capital ahead of the annual legislative session which begins next week.
Who among us hasn't thought of self-immolation when dealing with the local department of motor vehicles? I can't even begin to speculate on a possible reason for three people setting fire to themselves in China's most famous square at this particular time.
