TIBETANS in Lhasa have appealed for help to save the life of a man who, sources say, faces execution for staging a pro-independence demonstration in prison.
Prison authorities and the Labour Reform Bureau are said to have written to the procuratorate and the regional intermediate court calling for the death sentence to be handed down on 33-year-old Lodroe Gyatso.
Tibet's government-in-exile said last week that a lower court had passed a death sentence which was awaiting ratification from Tibet's High Court.
Lodroe, a professional dancer from Nagchu, northern Tibet, has been in Lhasa's Drapchi Prison since 1993, when he was sentenced to 15 years for killing a man. Sources say Lodroe, a member of the Sog County Dance Group, was acting in self-defence.
The threat of execution arises from a political incident in the prison, the sources say.
On March 4, two days after the Tibetan New Year, Lodroe shouted slogans in the prison compound and handed out leaflets he had written praising the Dalai Lama and calling for Tibetan independence, they say.
