World’s youngest political prisoner turns 17
Reuters Sun Apr 23, 2006 11:31pm ET INTERNATIONAL NEWS (l) By Benjamin Kang Lim
BEIJING (Reuters) - A Tibetan youth considered by rights groups to be the world’s youngest political prisoner turns 17 on Tuesday, 11 years after disappearing from public view when he was named the Himalayan region’s second-ranking religious figure.
The whereabouts of Gendun Choekyi Nyima — who human rights watchdogs say has been living under house arrest since Tibet’s exiled god-king, the Dalai Lama, appointed him the 11th Panchen Lama — is one of China’s most zealously guarded state secrets.
A senior Canadian official pressed for access to Nyima during a visit to Tibet this month, but it fell on deaf ears.
Chinese officials parroted their assertion that Nyima was “safe and comfortable and wishes to maintain his privacy”, said the Canadian, who requested anonymity.
The Chinese cabinet spokesman’s office did not reply to a list of questions submitted by fax a week ago.
The Dalai Lama’s unilateral announcement embarrassed and enraged China’s atheist Communists, who dropped Nyima’s name from a shortlist of candidates and endorsed Gyaltsen Norbu as the reincarnation of the 10th Panchen Lama, who died in 1989.
Tibetan Buddhists believe in reincarnation and that the soul of a “living Buddha” migrates to a boy born shortly after the holy monk’s death. [more]