New Delhi - Six Tibetan activists entered the second week of a hunger strike in New Delhi to protest the upcoming Beijing Olympics and "occupation" of Tibet by China, a spokesman said Monday.

The activists from the Tibetan Youth Congress staged their protest at the capital's Jantar Mantar area in the central business district of Connaught Place.

"The hunger strike has entered its eighth day today," the group's vice president, Dhondup Dorjee Shokda, said. "Their health has deteriorated rapidly as they have lost over 11 kilograms on an average."

He said the activists had so far resisted pleas by local police to take them to hospital.

"We will continue the strike," Shokda said, demanding the unconditional release of Tibetan political prisoners. "We want an immediate end to the brutal atrocities and suppression in Tibet."

The group also appealed to world leaders to boycott Friday's opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics.

"No doubt that the Chinese people deserve to host the Olympic Games, but what the Tibetan and Chinese people deserve more is freedom," the group said in a statement.

"The day might not be far when Tibet will be an independent nation and our Chinese brothers and sisters will be free from the inhuman Communist regime," the statement said. "Then it will be the right time for Beijing to host the prestigious Olympic Games."

India is home to the Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, as well as more than 100,000 other Tibetan refugees, estimated to be the largest concentration of Tibetans outside Tibet.

Tibetan refugee groups in India have been holding protests during the run-up to the Beijing Olympics, saying they want to use the occasion to draw international attention to China's human rights violations in Tibet. (dpa)