NEW YORK — Pro-Tibetan protesters marched by the hundreds in New York City on Tuesday, the 50th anniversary of the failed uprising that sent the Dalai Lama into exile.
The protest was mirrored by similar demonstrations in Europe and Asia as Tibetan exiles and supporters urged an end to Chinese rule in the region.
Demonstrators marched to the United Nations wearing T-shirts saying “Tibet — 50 years of resistance.” They planned to move on to the Chinese Consulate and other sites.
A consulate spokesman said officials have taken security precautions but have no other response to the protests.
Tuesday marked a half-century since the March 10, 1959, riots inside Tibet that led to a Chinese crackdown and, later that month, the Dalai Lama’s dramatic flight across the Himalayas and into exile.
There has been a widening rift between those still in Tibet and their Chinese rulers since new violence engulfed the region last year.
In India, thousands of young Tibetans marched through the streets Tuesday in Dharmsala, the town where the Dalai Lama set up his base after fleeing Tibet. The spiritual leader, now 73, told followers there that Chinese rulers were treating his people “like criminals deserving to be put to death.”
In Nepal, home to thousands of Tibetan exiles, police blocked about 100 Tibetans who demonstrated on the outskirts of the capital, Katmandu, chanting, “Stop killing in Tibet! Free Tibet!”
