Tibetans

A court handed down death sentences to two Tibetans accused of starting deadly fires in last year's anti-government riots in Tibet. It was the first report of death sentences in the March 2008 violence in the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, which Chinese officials say killed 22 people. The violence led to the most sustained uprising against Chinese rule in decades. The official New China News Agency said one man was sentenced to die for burning two clothing shops, killing a shop owner. A second man was given the death penalty for his role in the burning of a motorcycle shop that killed five people, it said.

A former Chinese functionary claims that security forces killed more than 450 Tibetans in the capital of Lhasa in 1989, the Observer newspaper reported. The Chinese government has reported that about a dozen people were killed March 5 and 6 of last year, the London newspaper said in its Sunday edition. The Observer's report was based on films and documents supplied by Tang Daxian, a former Chinese journalist now living in Paris.

There's a classic Grateful Dead tune with the lyrics "what a long strange trip it's been" that 10 Tibetan monks just starting a six-month U.S. fund-raising tour might want to adopt as a theme song. These monks on the "Joyful Wisdom Tour" are cheerful, friendly, open-minded and the embodiment of strangers in a strange land. The Tibetans' L.A.

When the Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts' Song and Dance Ensemble performs, the focus is on centuries-old songs and dances from the region's various districts. That makes its programs powerfully subversive. Since the flight into exile of 100,000 Tibetans in 1959, the Dharamsala, India-based institute has helped the refugees combat Chinese Communist repression and the prospect of losing their culture completely. Revolutions can be won one convert at a time--and far from the home front.

The riot began with a customer's complaint about her dinner. "Waitress, there's a tooth in my soup," a Tibetan woman said indignantly. Before long, a curious crowd of Tibetans gathered around the soup bowl. Restaurant owner Yun Sha came out of the kitchen and insisted that the offending item was just a chip off a lamb bone. "Let's trash this restaurant," Yun heard somebody scream, and the crowd proceeded to do just that. Tables, chairs, a television flew through the air.

Thousands of mourners on Thursday crowded the road to Dharmsala, India, to glimpse the body of a new kind of Tibetan martyr, while the movement's most famous member worked half a world away in the United States. The distance was more than physical.

The gifts of greeting were simple but heartfelt and traditional -- white scarves, a bowl of milk and a handful of barley. Children offered up songs and dances. Nearly all of Southern California's estimated 250 Tibetans and many of its Mongolians gathered at the Westin Pasadena hotel Monday to welcome His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama as he arrived for four days of teaching.

Chinese authorities have arrested two Tibetans accused of spying for the region's exiled government and plotting a videotaped self-immolation, Chinese media reported Friday. The official New China News Agency said Cengdan Gyaco and a man identified only as Tugyi crossed the border from Nepal into Tibet in July. Local security agents arrested Cengdan Gyaco shortly thereafter and captured Tugyi two weeks ago, the agency said.

The Dalai Lama, the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader, said Thursday that he will pass the reins of political power to the elected prime minister of the self-proclaimed Tibetan government in exile. The announcement formalizes the signals that the Tibetan leader has been sending for years in his efforts to avoid a political vacuum after his death and to ensure credible leadership amid Chinese crackdowns and mounting global pressure. But the Dalai Lama, 75, made a point of saying he wasn't "retiring," and his global status and reputation ensure that he will continue to play a major role in Tibetan affairs.

In a ceremony attended by senior Communist Party officials and Tibetan monks loyal to Beijing, the Chinese government on Friday formally installed a 6-year-old boy as the reincarnation of the Panchen Lama, second only to the Dalai Lama in the Tibetan Buddhist hierarchy.