He was convicted in 2002 of separatism and being involved in a bombing in a public square and was initially condemned to death.

By Louise Watt, The Associated Press on July 13, 2015. Police in Sichuan province, south-west China, confirmed that he had died but declined to give further details.

A Tibetan monk who was one of China’s most prominent political prisoners has died in jail, a relative and the Tibetan government-in-exile said on Monday, raising the prospect of an increase in resentment of the government in Tibetan regions. He was 65.

His death sentence was later commuted to life imprisonment, but Lobsang Dondrub was executed nearly immediately, prompting an outcry from rights activists who questioned the fairness of the trial.

Two years after the sentences were handed down, a Human Rights Watch report said the proceedings against Tenzin were “procedurally flawed” and the monk was charged to “curb his efforts to foster Tibetan Buddhism and his work to develop Tibetan social and cultural institutions”.

Delek maintained his innocence throughout his sentence, the SFT statement said, adding that his family had asked police for his body so that they could perform funeral rites.

The 65-year-old Tenzin, jailed since 2002, died on Sunday, just days after it became known that he was ailing, RFA said, citing Tibetan sources who spoke on condition of anonymity. She refused to identify herself.

Last year, they had applied for medical parole for him on the grounds that he suffered from a heart condition, high blood pressure, dizzy spells and problems with his legs that had caused him to fall on a number of occasions.

He was born in 1950 in a Tibetan area of Sichuan and stayed in India from 1982 to 1987 to study under the Dalai Lama.

Tibet’s spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, fled into exile in India in 1959 after an abortive uprising against Chinese rule. In 1987 he returned to China, where he worked to establish monasteries, clinics, schools and orphanages.

Tenzin Delek was a supporter of the Dalai Lama, said Dorjee Tseten, who said he had heard about his death from five sources.

His family has called for authorities to release his body.

Police in the south-western Sichuan city of Chengdu, where Tenzin Delek was being held, informed his relatives of his death on Sunday, rights group Students for a Free Tibet said.