Recently in Tibet Category

By Edward Wong | The New York Times
24 July 2010

They come by new high-altitude trains, four a day, cruising 1,200 miles past snow-capped mountains. And they come by military truck convoy, lumbering across the roof of the world.

Han Chinese workers, investors, merchants, teachers and soldiers are pouring into remote Tibet. After the violence that ravaged this region in 2008, China's aim is to make Tibet wealthier -- and more Chinese.

Chinese leaders see development, along with an enhanced security presence, as the key to pacifying the Buddhist region. The central government invested $3 billion in the Tibet Autonomous Region last year, a 31 percent increase over 2008. Tibet's gross domestic product is growing at a 12 percent annual rate, faster than the robust Chinese national average.

Simple restaurants located in white prefabricated houses and run by ethnic Han businesspeople who take the train have sprung up even at a remote lake north of Lhasa. About 1.2 million rural Tibetans, nearly 40 percent of the region's population, have been moved into new residences under a "comfortable housing" program. And officials promise to increase tourism fourfold by 2020, to 20 million visitors a year.

But if the influx of money and people has brought new prosperity, it has also deepened the resentment among many Tibetans. Migrant Han entrepreneurs elbow out Tibetan rivals, then return home for the winter after reaping profits. Large Han-owned companies dominate the main industries, from mining to construction to tourism.

"Why did I come here? To make money, of course!" said Xiong Zhahua, a migrant from Sichuan Province who spends five months a year running a restaurant on the shores of chilly Nam Tso, the lake north of Lhasa.

A rare five-day official tour of Tibet, though carefully managed by the Chinese Foreign Ministry, provided a glimpse of life in the region during a period of tight political and military control.

Tibet is more stable after security forces quelled the worst uprising against Chinese rule in five decades. But the increased ethnic Han presence -- and the uneven benefits of Han-led investment -- have kept the region on edge.

Some Chinese officials acknowledge the disenfranchisement of Tibetans, though they defend the right of Han to migrate here.

"The flow of human resources follows the rule of market economics and is also indispensable for the development of Tibet," Hao Peng, vice chairman and deputy party secretary of the region, said at a news conference with a small group of foreign journalists. But the current system "may have caused an imbalanced distribution," he said. "We are taking measures to solve this problem."

The government bars foreign reporters from traveling independently in Tibet. Journalists on the tour were brought to several development projects by ministry officials, but were occasionally able to interview locals on their own. Tibetans interviewed independently expressed fear of the security forces and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

One high school student complained that Tibetans could not compete for jobs with Han migrants who arrived with high school diplomas. "Tibetans just get low-end jobs," he said.

Chinese officials say Tibetans make up more than 95 percent of the region's 2.9 million people, but refuse to give estimates on Han migrants, who are not registered residents. In the cities of Lhasa and Shigatse, it is clear that Han neighborhoods are dwarfing Tibetan areas.

Resentment of the Han exploded during the March 2008 rioting -- Tibetans in Lhasa burned and looted hundreds of Han and ethnic Hui shops; at least 19 people died, most of them Han civilians, the Chinese government said. Han security forces then cracked down on Tibetans across the plateau.

Robert Barnett, a scholar of Tibet at Columbia University, said the goal of maintaining double-digit growth in the region had worsened ethnic tensions.

"Of course, they achieved that, but it was disastrous," he said. "They had no priority on local human resources, so of course they relied on outside labor, and sucked in large migration into the towns."

Now, a heavy security presence is needed to keep control of Lhasa. Around the Barkhor, the city's central market, paramilitary officers in riot gear, all ethnic Han, march counterclockwise around the sacred Jokhang Temple, against the flow of Tibetan pilgrims. Armed men stand on rooftops near the temple.

Limits on religious freedom have been a major cause of discontent. In the Jokhang itself, and in the Potala Palace, the imposing white-walled winter fortress of the Dalai Lamas, images of the exiled 14th Dalai Lama have been banned. Pilgrims carry the Dalai Lama's photograph in hidden lockets or amulets. As the pilgrims circle the Potala, a loudspeaker in a small park blares Communist Party propaganda: "We are part of a Chinese nation contributing to a great future -- we are Chinese people."

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By RADIO FREE ASIA
4th of July 2010

A Tibetan environmentalist is sentenced on charges of "splittism" a week after his brother's trial.

Award-winning Tibetan environmentalist Rinchen Samdrup, 44, was sentenced on Saturday to five years in prison on charges of "inciting to split the nation." 

The Chamdo Intermediate People's Court found Samdrup guilty of "splittism" based on evidence that an article about the Dalai Lama had been posted on Samdrup's Web site.

Samdrup pleaded not guilty and said during the trial that someone else had posted the article.

"The court recessed for 20 minutes and the verbal verdict of five years imprisonment was given, which seems to have been decided long before the hearing in court," Samdrup's eldest daughter Dorjee Sangmo said.

Rinchen Samdrup's sentence comes just over one week after his brother, Karma Samdrup, was sentenced to the maximum penalty of 15 years for grave robbery, on charges that had been originally dropped in 1998. Karma Samdrup was also involved in environmental activism.

Rinchen Samdrup had been running an environmental NGO in Gonjo county in the eastern part of the Tibet Autonomous Region, near Sichuan province.

The organization's work involves reforestation, publishing a magazine, and mobilizing local people to report poaching.  The group had earned international awards including grants from Ford Motors and the Jet Li One Foundation. 

Samdrup was detained in August 2009 after he had accused local officials in Gonjo county of hunting endangered animals.

"Our father had to face this situation because of some local government officials of Chamdo prefecture," his daughter said.

"We the four family members were allowed to be inside the courtroom, but we were not allowed to meet him. We were not allowed to meet him since his detention in August last year. Our father was looking very weak. He was not allowed to sleep well and had been repeatedly interrogated," she said. 

His lawyer, Xia Jun, said the he had not been able to meet with Samdrup since his first court session in January.

"This case is unique and I tried my best to present my defense and prove his innocence. I am disappointed by this court decision. It is difficult to say anything more under this situation," he said.

Rinchen Samdrup has 10 days to appeal the sentence, and his daughter said that he will be applying to a higher court in Lhasa. She said that the conviction document would be given to the lawyer within five days.

Relatives Targeted

"We don't know whether this is a personal grudge by leading officials against this family or an attack on Tibetan environmentalists or a combination [of those]," Robbie Barnett, the director of modern Tibetan studies at the Weatherhead East Asian Studies Institute of Columbia University, said.

"Last year when I went to Beijing to appeal for my father, I was detained for ten days," Rinchen Samdrup's daughter said.

Rinchen Samdrup's brother Karma Samdrup was detained in January after he had visited Rinchen in detention.

Their youngest brother, Chime Namgyal, 38, was detained in August alongside Rinchen Samdrup for helping him with his NGO work. Since then he has been serving a 21-month sentence of re-education through labor for harming national security.

In addition to the three brothers, two of the brothers' cousins have also been targeted, according to Barnett.

Their cousin Sonam Choephel, was sentenced to one and a half years of re-education through labor after organizing a group to petition in Beijing on Rinchen Samdrup's behalf, he said.

Another cousin, Rinchen Dorje, a monk who had worked with Karma Samdrup as his interpreter, was reported to have been detained by authorities in March, and his family says he is currently missing, according to Barnett.

Several artists and intellectuals have been detained or have disappeared in recent months in what activists say amounts to the broadest suppression of Tibetan culture and expression in years.

Tensions have frequently risen in Tibetan areas of China since deadly rioting broke out following days of peaceful protests by Tibetans in their capital, Lhasa, in March 2008.

"I think we can see very clearly that in the last two years Chinese security forces in Tibetan areas have significantly shifted their targets from monks, lower-middle class activists, nuns, etc., to intellectuals seen as cultural figures. And this is because those people were involved and were mobilized by the Chinese reaction to the protests of March 2008, Barnett said.

"And this [Rinchen Samdrup's] case fits in with that general pattern."

Original reporting by Dolkar for RFA's Tibetan service. Translated from the Tibetan by Karma Dorjee. Tibetan service director: Jigme Ngapo. Written for the Web in English by Rachel Vandenbrink. Additional reporting by newswires.

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By Christopher Bodeen - The Associated Press via UNCENSORED Yahoo! News (Canada)
June 22, 2010

A Tibetan environmentalist once praised by Chinese state media as a model philanthropist went on trial Tuesday in western China on what supporters say are politically motivated charges aimed at punishing him for his activism.

Karma Samdrup, 42, appeared gaunt and shrunken during Tuesday's opening session, his wife and lawyer said.

In his statement to the court, he said that during months of interrogation, officers beat him, deprived him of sleep for days on end, and drugged him with a substance that made his eyes and ears bleed, they said.

"If not for his voice, I would not have recognized him," wife Zhenga Cuomao told The Associated Press by phone from the courthouse in remote Yanqi county in the Xinjiang region adjoining Tibet.

Karma Samdrup was arrested Jan. 3 after speaking up for his two brothers, also environmental activists, who were detained after accusing local officials in eastern Tibet of poaching endangered species. He is accused of dealing in looted antiquities, charges dating from 1998 that were not pursued until this year.

Lawyer Pu Zhiqiang alleged numerous irregularities in the prosecution, including the use of new documents that removed evidence favourable to his client and added new testimony against him. He said the indictment had been translated from Chinese into a Tibetan dialect different from that spoken by Karma Samdrup, making it impossible for him to understand it.

Pu also questioned the legitimacy of prosecutor Kuang Ying, saying he believed she had been transferred from the Xinjiang regional prosecutor's office specifically for the case in violation of regulations.

Pu said Kuang denied violence had been used against Karma Samdrup. People who answered calls to the court and prosecutors' office refused to answer questions.

Beatings and torture are believed to be routine among Chinese police, despite official bans.

While Karma Samdrup, named philanthropist of the year in 2006 by state broadcaster CCTV, was not known to be politically outspoken, authorities in tightly controlled Tibet are extremely sensitive to any form of social activism and criticism of their work, either explicit or implied.

Karma Samdrup's younger brother, Chime Namgyal, is reportedly serving a 21-month sentence in a labour camp on the vague charge of harming national security. His older brother, Rinchen Samdrup, was scheduled to be tried on a similar charge on Thursday, but that date has since been postponed.

The cases come amid increased repression of Tibetan intellectuals, an echo of the massive security crackdown that followed rioting in the capital Lhasa in 2008 in which at least 22 people died.

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By Radio Free Asia
May 21, 2010

Authorities in Tibet ban popular ringtones characterized as 'separatist.'

Students and teachers at a high school near the Tibetan city of Shigatse have been told to delete certain popular Tibetan-language songs from their cell phones after they were designated "unhealthy" by local education officials, according to its Web site.

The school announced recently that owing to the "increasing complexity of separatism," a list of 27 popular Tibetan-language tracks had been banned, whether in audio or video disk format, or as digital media files on people's cell phones.

"Staff and students must not have any of the above songs as their mobile phone ringtone," an April 21 statement posted on the school's Web site, but since removed, said.

"If you have any of these songs as your ringtone, please will you delete them; if you own any of the above discs, please will you destroy them by melting or burning them," it added.

It said the school's Communist Party committee, the education and politics department and the Youth League branch would be carrying out clean-up campaigns targeting the banned songs.

"Anyone possessing the illegal music or videos will be severely dealt with," it warned.

It listed the 27 songs, which appeared mostly to be in the Tibetan language, and included titles like "Happy Shambala," "The Hope of the Son of the Snow-City," "The Five-Colored Prayer Flags (Tibetan-language version)," "Snow-Mountain Folk (Tibetan)" and "The Awaited Hope."

The order was posted by Beijing-based Tibetan writer and blogger Woeser, who also detailed further restrictions on the cultural lives of Tibetans in their capital Lhasa, which was rocked by widespread protests and rioting in March 2008.

Copy shops affected

An employee who answered the phone at a photocopy shop in Lhasa said the new rules applied to materials written in Tibetan.

"Basically it's to do with the Dalai Lama. You can't copy stuff about him in Tibetan," she said.

"Most of us can't read Tibetan. The Dalai Lama has to do with separatists, that's the main thing...a lot of our customers think it's a real pain, having to register."

Sources in Lhasa said that most copy shops in the city were run by Han Chinese, who have poured into the Himalayan region in recent years on a new railroad line.

"They say it's very hard to get a license [to run a copy shop] nowadays," the employee said. "We got ours a while back, but I heard it's much more difficult now."

The proprietor of a second print services shop in Lhasa confirmed that customers wanting to make photocopies had to produce their identity cards.

"It's [effective] from this month," he said. "It's better this way. It's a bit safer. It is good for everyone."

Woeser said that regulations of a similar sort had been in existence for a while, but had never been strictly enforced.

"It's a way of cowing people," she said. "But it'll probably rebound on them, making people very uncomfortable, micromanaging them to this extent."

Cultural contributors targeted

China has jailed scores of Tibetan writers, artists, singers, and educators for asserting Tibetan national identity and civil rights in the two years since widespread protests swept the region, according to the Washington-based International Campaign for Tibet (ICT).

The report said some 31 writers, bloggers and intellectuals had been jailed for expressing unwelcome views since the March 2008 violence and demonstrations, which spread across Tibetan regions of China in the months that followed.

ICT released "A 'Raging Storm:' The Crackdown on Tibetan Writers & Artists after Tibet's Spring 2008 Protests" on May 18, saying that Tibetans had continued to write down and publish their own accounts of what had happened during the protests.

While initial writing efforts were published unofficially and quickly suppressed, they have been followed by a boom in Tibetan fiction and essay writing, with younger, tech-savvy Tibetans playing a key role, the group said.

Original reporting in Mandarin by Ding Xiao. Mandarin service director: Jennifer Chou. Translated and written for the Web in English by Luisetta Mudie. Edited by Sarah Jackson-Han.

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By Radio Free Asia
07 May 2010

Tibetans say mining at a sacred site prompted a major earthquake.

Tibetan herders in the remote western Chinese province of Qinghai have hit out at a mining company after it sank deep shafts into two sacred mountains in the area.

Four weeks before a devastating 6.9 degree earthquake hit the Yushu Tibetan region of Qinghai on April 14, local villagers have already taken their complaint about the Qinghai Xinyu Mining Co. as far as China's cabinet, the State Council, villagers and bloggers said.

"The earthquake happened on the day after they opened the seam," said Dhonwang, a Tibetan resident of Gyegu [in Chinese, Jiegu] township in Qinghai's Yushu Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture.

He said said local people were saying that diggers had reached the belly of the sacred mountain in Shanglaxiu village on the day before the earthquake, and that the two events were connected.

A second Tibetan resident of Gyegu, Tsering, also said nomadic herders from Shanlaxiu, Batang, and Xiaosumang villages in the Sanjiangyuan district were linking the earthquake to mining activites under two sacred mountains in the region.

"After the earthquake happened on [April] 14, a lot of the local people were threatening to kill the people who had taken part in the digging of the mine because they said they had now stirred up the sacred mountain and that this had caused the earthquake," he said.

"By the third or fourth day after the earthquake, most of the people in charge of the mine had fled."

Ecological damage from the mining operation had sparked complaints and petitions from local residents on several occasions, Tsering said.

Photos censored

Beijing-based Tibetan blogger and writer Woeser said a post reporting their petition in Beijing had been removed from a Tibet-related blog, blog.tibetcul.com, by censors.

In the blog post illustrated by more than 20 photos, the site detailed how a group of Tibetans from Xiaosumang had filed a petition with the State Council complaints office in Beijing, calling for an investigation into the company's operations.

They were complaining that the mining company was operating within an area that was supposed to be under environmental protection, and yet it was failing to take into account the personal safety or the property of local people, and that they were harming the fragile local ecosystem.

In their report, the villagers said that unrestricted mining activities in the region since 2003 had led to maternal and infant health problems, which they blamed on chemical pollutants allowed into the local environment.

Local young women had been unable to give birth naturally, and 90 percent of babies had been stillborn or born with deformities, they claimed.

They called on the central government to launch an investigation under China's environmental protection law into the activities of the Qinghai Xinyu Mining Co. and into unnamed mining executives from Putian city in the southeastern province of Fujian.

Questions raised

Sichuan-based government seismologist Fan Xiao said that mine shafts didn't go deep enough to have a direct effect on the faultline along which the Qinghai earthquake occurred.

"Sometimes, very sudden events, or man-made activity, can be linked [to earthquakes]," said Fan, who has argued that China's extensive hydroelectric dam-building program could have triggered the 2008 Sichuan earthquake.

"But it's not very easy to provide a scientific explanation for the sort of links you are talking about, although it seems that they are linked in some way," he said.

Original reporting in Cantonese by Hai Nan. Cantonese service director: Shiny Li. Translated from  the Chinese and written for the Web in English by Luisetta Mudie. Edited by Sarah Jackson-Han

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