Choepel, 19, and Khayang, 18, are believed to have previously been Buddhist monks at the Kirti Monastery in Aba prefecture, Sichuan province, a major site of protest against Chinese policies, Free Tibet said in an e-mailed statement.
Choepel died at the scene, while the condition and whereabouts of Khayang were unknown, the London-based group said, citing unconfirmed reports from local sources.
Their act follows a spate of similar incidents involving young Tibetan monks to protest against religious controls by the government, which labels their exiled spiritual leader the Dalai Lama a violent separatist.
“It is now evident there are many courageous young Tibetans who are determined to draw global attention to one of the world’s greatest and longest-standing human rights crises no matter the cost to themselves,” Free Tibet Director Stephanie Brigden said in the statement.
“The international community can no longer stand silent in the face of the ongoing violent Chinese state repression of the Tibetan people,” she said.
China in August jailed three monks for their involvement in the March self-immolation by another monk named Phuntsog, which spurred a harsh crackdown and the month-long detention of about 300 Tibetan monks. .
Free Tibet said Choepel had been expelled from the monastery after that incident.
The statement said it was unclear why Khayang had left the monastery, but that his uncle was one of 13 people shot dead by Chinese security forces during protests in Aba in March 2008 — spillover unrest from riots in Lhasa, the capital of what Beijing terms the Tibet Autonomous Region.
“Nothing like that happened here. I am not aware of the situation,” a woman at the public security bureau in Aba prefecture, called Ngaba by local Tibetans, told Reuters when contacted by phone.
A monk from the same monastery set himself alight in a market on Monday. Two other 18-year-old monks, Kelsang and Kunchak, set themselves on fire in late September, and Chinese state media said they had suffered light burns.
China has ruled Tibet with an iron fist since Communist troops marched in in 1950. It says its rule has bought much needed development to a poor and backward region.
Beijing and the Nobel Peace Prize-winning Dalai Lama have argued lately about what should happen when he dies. Beijing says he has to reincarnate, but the Dalai Lama has questioned whether this tradition should continue.
Tibetans fear that China will use the thorny issue of the Dalai Lama’s religious succession to split the movement, with one new Lama named by exiles and one by China after his death.
