In an attempt to hide the ongoing birth control policy in the “Tibetan Autonomous Region” (TAR), Chinese health authorities forbid the official use of words relating to birth control. A notice, dated 13 September 1995, sent to all levels of government offices and stressing the use of scientific terms was recently smuggled into India and translated below from the original…
Tenpa Wangdrak, a 53 year-old former monk of Ganden Monastery, comes from Yartoe Yarzam in Lhoka Nedong County. His parents are no longer living but he has a sister who has occasionally visited him whilst in prison. He received a 14 year prison term for openly shouting the independent status of Tibet. While serving his prison term in Drapchi, he…
Chinese authorities have announced through newspaper and radio broadcasts that Beijing will tighten its security measures in the whole of Tibet, Inner Mongolia and Xinjiang because of the speculated unrest and trouble from Tibetans and others calling for their independence during the Hong Kong takeover on 1 July 1997. It has been reported on Voice of America that the Chinese…
Ngawang Lhundrup, a recent arrival from Tibet, was a monk from Shedrupling Monastery in Lhoka Gonkar at the age of 14. He took part in a demonstration in Barkhor, Lhasa, in 1992, as a result of which he spent 2 years in Gutsa Prison. He recounted the story of a political prisoner’s life in a Chinese prison in Tibet. Ngawang…
Independent sources have reported on two Tibetans arrested in late 1996 by Apa Hsien Public security Bureau in connection with possession of wooden printing blocks used for printing pro-independence posters. Jamyang Tsakli, aged around 35 years, from Apa Hsien proper, had run a small shop in Apa Hsien. The other, named Gonpo, was from Ngapo. After their arrest they were…
Sources in Lhasa report a recent decision that the Tibetan Language Department of the University of Tibet in Lhasa will not take any new students for the academic year of 1997-98. The reason given by the university authorities is that the syllabus is being changed and the new books required have not yet been compiled. This decision follows policy changes…
Only 16 monks remain in Tashi Gang Monastery at Nyethang in Chushul county, just nine of whom are registered. A monk from the monastery reports that 10 Tashi Gang monks have thus far been imprisoned for political activities of whom six are still serving their sentences in various prisons in Tibet. The four released monks, all of whom were subsequently…
Already having served nine months imprisonment for Tibetan independence activities, Sonam Gonpo was arrested again in 1996 after Chinese authorities suspected he and his musical group of propagating independence messages. Sonam Gonpo, commonly known as Sogon, was born in Tsenyi township under Ngapa prefecture now incorporated into the Chinese province of Sichuan. He studied in Ngapa County Middle School from…
In April 1995, Lodroe Gyatso was awaiting his execution as a result of staging a one-man independence demonstration while in Drapchi prison. The former dance artist was saved by his fellow prisoners who were able to smuggle the news of his impending death to the international community. Lodroe Gyatso is a 37-year-old dance artist and three-times weight-lifting champion in Sok…
The influx of Chinese population into Tibet is now so great and the impact, worse. Chinese language has almost replaced our mother tongue in various places. In a place like Pae, about 300 km from Lhasa, one can not differentiate between a Chinese and a Tibetan. When I enter a restaurant there are people in Tibetan traditional costume but who…
When Chinese officials enter your monastery, snatch away your freedom to practise your religious faith, replace your spiritual lessons with communist ideology and finally scorn your dreams of national independence, it is difficult to do nothing. When the Chinese work-team proclaimed: “Tibet’s independence is a daylight dream and is never to come true”, Lobsang, a monk in Dunbhu Choekhor Monastery,…