At Everest base camp, Americans arrested for pro-Tibet protest

BEIJING — Three Americans and a Tibetan-American were detained on Mount Everest today as they called for independence for Tibet and protested against the Beijing Olympics, an activist group said.

The protest was organized by Students for a Free Tibet, which said three people were taken away after holding up a banner at a base camp on the Tibetan side of the mountain that said "One World, One Dream, Free Tibet 2008."

The fourth person detained by Chinese authorities was a cameraperson, said the group's executive director Lhadon Tethong. "One World, One Dream" is the slogan of the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

The International Olympic Committee will announce the route for the 2008 Olympic torch relay in Beijing on Thursday. Chinese officials have said they want to take it to the top of the world's tallest mountain on the border between Nepal and Tibet.

"The Chinese government hopes to use the 2008 Olympic Games to conceal the brutality of its occupation of Tibet," Tethong said from the Nepalese capital, Katmandu.

One of the protesters, reached by cell phone, said they had been well treated but did not know how long they would be held.

"We were questioned separately by police and they took our passports away," said Kierstan Westby of Boulder, Colo.

She said they displayed the banner for about 30 minutes before local authorities took them away. "We are hoping they take us to the border and let us go."

Tethong said more than 70 Chinese climbers were in the base camp preparing for a trial climb to see if it is possible to take a torch to the top of 29,035-foot Mount Everest.

"One of the key points for the Chinese in their Olympic propaganda is to show happy Tibetans. They are very much using the Olympics, so we are also using it to call for an independent Tibet," Tethong said.

China says it has ruled Tibet for centuries, although many Tibetans say they were essentially an independent state for most of that time. Chinese communist troops occupied Tibet in 1951 and Beijing continues to rule the region with a heavy hand.