HUMAN rights groups condemned human rights abuses in Tibet in a protest at the Chinese consulate in Durban on Tuesday, the second day of the state visit to South Africa by President Jiang Zemin. In a scuffle during the protest, Chinese consulate officials held a group of demonstrators until they handed over film after a photograph was taken of the consulate. They would also not accept a letter from the 25 protestors, from human rights watchdog Amnesty International and a group called the Tibetan Society of South Africa. The protestors paraded outside the consulate dressed in black and wearing masks with gagged mouths to protest torture and lack of free speech in Tibet, occupied by China in 1950. Jiang was in Pretoria, where he held talks with President Thabo Mbeki. Human rights groups have criticised South Africa’s silence on human rights abuses in China. Mbeki in December turned down a one-to-one meeting with Tibet’s exiled religious leader the Dalai Lama, who was visiting South Africa.