Police have apprehended 18 Tibetans who crossed the Nepal border from China without legal documents.

A report posted in the website of Radio Free Asia (RFA), a private nonprofit media group, said the Tibetans were held by the Nepal police in Bara district on November 27 when were found without legal documents and lacked money to pay the fines.

“Nepalese border police arrested 18 Tibetans on November 27,” the RFA quoted Lhundup Dorjee the Kathmandu-based Tibetan Reception Center for Refugees as saying.

The group was traveling in a vehicle at the time of their arrest after crossing over to Bara district through Solukhumbu border, the report further said and added that since the Tibetans didn’t have money to pay, they were detained at the Central Jail on November 28.

The Tibatans who were brought to the capital on November 28 were first handed over to police, who in turn handed them over to the Immigration Office. Two of the detained Tibetans are women.

Neither Nepali authorities nor the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) have said anything officially on these reports.

It is estimated that 2,500 to 3,000 Tibetan refugees enter Nepal every year after a long and arduous journey through the Himalayan passes from the Chinese Autonomous Region of Tibet.

The government claims the total number of Tibetan refugees in Nepal is not more than 15,000 while the actual figure could be much higher.