Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

DHARAMSHALA, May 29: In reports coming just in, a Tibetan man set himself on fire in Adril region of eastern Tibet protesting China’s occupation and hard-line policies in Tibet.

Tenzin Sherab, 31, carried out his self-immolation protest on May 27. He succumbed to his injuries at the site of his fiery protest.

According to Jampa Younten, a monk living in south India, Tenzin Sherab’s family members and friends came to know about his self-immolation protest only after he had passed away.

On Monday last week, Taiwan Democracy Watch released the results of a poll on the top 10 democracy-related events, which showed that the primary concern among those polled was the continued threat to freedom of expression. The results also contained a list of five influential factors on democracy and third on this list was the “China factor.”

This deserves further exploration.

Recently, the perennial question of whether Chunghwa Telecom will renew New Tang Dynasty Asia Pacific Television’s (NTDTV) broadcasting contract has once more hit the headlines, suggesting that the decision to renew is more than a simply commercial one.