Iron Hare 2011 – flames of resistance
from the villages and monasteries in proximity to the county town, and it is hard to get information from further afield.
March 26 On March 23 2011 at around 4 pm local time, more than 100 local people in Namda township, Dzamtang county, in Sichuan’s Ngaba prefecture staged a protest calling for freedom in Tibet and the return of the Dalai Lama, declaring Tibet to be independent. They had marched three times around the main street of the town when police and soldiers arrived and started to savagely beat all the protestors they could lay their hands on. Eight people were arrested and detained, of whom the following names are known: Palko, aged 40, a teacher at the township school; Dorje, a 35 year old man; Ador, a 35 year old man; Osel Dorje, a 28 year old man. The names of the others are not known. After the protest, a strict military clampdown was imposed on Namda township, and as late as March 28, other areas too were subject to strict control as the security forces continued to search for participants in the protest. Tenzin of the Amey Lota house, in the Chukley Gabma community of Cha township of Ngaba county, a monk at Kirti monastery aged approximately 21 was arrested from his room at the monastery at midnight on the night of March 25. The reason for his arrest is uncertain, but he had not been released by March 27. Armed police with dogs continue to patrol inside the monastery by night. On March 24 the authorities called public meetings in upper Tawa and Gabma villages in Ngaba county at which they ordered villagers to come for security duty at Kirti monastery, 14