Nepal: Everest climbing season resumes after torch climb

KATMANDU, Nepal — Nepal allowed the climbing season on Mount Everest to resume Friday after blocking access to hundreds of climbers so a Chinese team carrying the Olympic flame could ascend without the threat of protests.

Tourism Ministry official Dinesh Adhikari said climbers who had been waiting at the Mount Everest base camp could now depart for higher ground, lifting a nine-day ban on ascents on the world's tallest mountain.

(enlarge photo) In this image made from television released by China's Xinhua news agency, Chinese climbers, carrying the Olympic flame, spurt to the top of Mount Everest at the 8,850-meter (29,035-foot) peak in southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region Thursday, May 8, 2008. The Olympic flame launched the final assault on Mount Everest in hopes of reaching the top of the world's tallest mountain around Thursday midmorning, state media reported. (AP Photo/CCTV via Xinhua)

Chinese climbers took the Olympic torch to the 29,035-foot summit Thursday from the Tibetan side of the mountain. Though they were climbing from the north side, Nepal also had banned climbing on the mountain's southern side to prevent any anti-China protests during the torch ascent.

Hundreds of climbers were boxed in at the base camp since May 1, waiting for the Chinese to complete their torch relay on the mountain.

Adhikari said although the climbers could leave the base camp at 17,400 feet on Friday it would take a few days of altitude acclimatization before they could make their attempt on the summit.

The Nepalese government has given permission to 290 climbers from 32 expedition teams to climb Mount Everest during the popular spring season, which ends in a few weeks.

About 150 Tibetans, many of them monks and nuns, protested near the Chinese embassy visa office in Katmandu chanting "Free Tibet. We want freedom." They were blocked by Nepalese police who detained all of them.

Police official R.P. Dhamala said they would likely be freed by night.

Nepal has said it will not allow protests against any friendly countries including China. Police have breaking up almost all these protest since they began the latest series of demonstrations in March.

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