Tibetan Teenage Girl Dies in Self Immolation Protest, Continuing Trend

A teenage girl has become the latest in a series of Tibetans to set themselves on fire to protest Chinese Communist policies in Tibet. 18-year-old Tenzin Choedon was a nun at a Buddhist religious institution in the heavily Tibetan Aba region of Sichuan Province. Tenzin is believed to have died from the severe burns she sustained during her protest, according to a report by the UK-based NGO Free Tibet. The organization estimates that 18 nuns, monks, and laypeople have engaged in similar self-immolation protests over the past year, with 12 resulting deaths. Some of the self-immolators have carried pictures or made statements supporting of Tibet's exiled religious leader, the Dalai Lama, who has expressed distress over the current protest movement.