LONDON - A military delegation comprised of People's Liberation Army (PLA) generals is visiting the UK this week with their schedule centred around parliamentary engagements. The delegation, headed by Lt General Zhao Gang who is Vice President of Beijing's National Defence University, met with the Defence Committee and part of their agenda is to discuss 'military reform', Students for a Free Tibet UK has learned. The visit comes at a time when areas of Tibet remain under tight military control and a year on from well documented instances of mass demonstrations by Tibetans being dispersed by indiscriminate gunfire by PLA soldiers. During the visit, news has emerged from Tibet of another instance of gunfire being used to suppress protest, as a violent crackdown against a Tibetan farming boycott in the Chamdo area led to a demonstrator named Tsering being shot. The severity of Tsering's injuries are unknown at the time of writing.

In May 2009 Tsewang Dhondup and his brother escaped into exile having been involved in last year's demonstrations. Tsewang, himself shot and seriously injured by the Chinese military whilst helping a wounded monk, has given testimony detailing the lethal force used by the PLA against demonstrators in Dragko County on 24 March 2008. Tsewang stated: “Around 4:30 pm on March 24, a massive protest demonstration led by around 150 nuns from Ngangong Nunnery broke out in Dragko. Several more monks from Palden Chokri and hundreds of lay people, mainly farmers later joined the march." Tsewang spoke of how Chinese forces "indiscriminately opened fire on the demonstrators, shelled tear gas and used electric prods and iron batons to quell the protest.”

"This delegation is visiting shortly after the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, and it is important to emphasise that two decades later PLA generals are just as willing to order the shooting of unarmed peaceful protesters," said Terry Bettger, spokesperson for Students for a Free Tibet UK, "Over the past 15 months excessive and lethal force has been meted out against Tibetans by PLA forces simply because they called out for their fundamental human rights and freedoms. Students for a Free Tibet UK call upon British parliamentarians to make strong representations to the PLA delegation condemning such actions and demanding serious military reform to prevent such atrocities occurring in the future."