THE WORLD'S YOUNGEST POLITICAL PRISONER ; At the age of five, Gedhun Choekyi Niyama was abducted by the Chinese from his remote Tibetan village and has not been seen since. His crime? He was identified by the Dalai Lama as the reincarnation of one of the most important figures in Tibetan Buddhism. As he reaches adulthood, Peter Popham reports ++ Religious persecution

From: The Independent (London, England) | Date: April 26, 2007| Author: | Copyright information

Yesterday, somewhere in China, a boy became a man. Exactly where, only the Chinese authorities can say, and they are not telling. What he looks like now we have an idea but only an idea: the only photograph of him, reproduced here, was taken when he was still a young child, around the time the Dalai Lama announced he was the reincarnated Panchen Lama.

That was 12 years ago, in 1995, and for five-year-old Gedhun Choekyi Nyima, son of the headman of a village in central Tibet, the announcement meant the end of a normal childhood. He and his parents were seized by Chinese security forces and ...

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