Two of Tibet's longest-serving political prisoners have received reductions in their jail terms, a London-based group said.
Both are members of the "Group of Ten," an alliance of monks from Lhasa's Drepung monastery who formed in the late 1980s to promote democracy and the teachings of the exiled Dalai Lama, the Tibet Information Network said Tuesday.
Jamphel Jangchub, believed to be 47 years old, received a three-year reduction in his 19-year sentence and is now expected to be released in April 2005 from Lhasa's Drapchi prison.
Ngawang Oezer, aged about 39, got a two-year reduction in his 17-year sentence, and is now due for release in April next year.
"The sentence reductions will be welcomed by those who have worked on the monks' behalf," Tibet Information Network said.
Several governments, including those of the United States and Britain, have raised the issue of the two monks in meetings with Chinese officials over the past decade, the group said.
The "Group of Ten," who used carved wooden blocks to publish their views, were sentenced in 1989 while Tibet was ruled by current Chinese President Hu Jintao.
It was a time of rising tension in the Himalayan region that led to the imposition of martial law.
At their sentencing, the "Group of Ten" were slammed by the Chinese authorities as being a "counterrevolutionary clique ... seriously undermining national security," the group said.
Of the group, five monks are confirmed or believed to have been released, while four remain in jail.
One, Jamphel Khedrub, died in a prison clinic in 1996 after he was tortured during an "evaluation of his progress in thought reform," the group said.
While prison reductions occasionally take place at Drapchi prison, where the monks are held, prison extensions are much more common, according to the group.
The group said nearly 60 Drapchi prisoners are confirmed or believed to have had their prison terms extended because of political activity carried out from their cells.
China has occupied Tibet since 1951 and has been accused of trying to wipe out Tibet's Buddhist-based culture through political and religious repression and ethnic Chinese immigration.
The region's spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, and his followers fled in 1959 after a failed uprising against Chinese rule and set up base in the Indian hill station of Dharamsala.