ngawang jamyang

21/03/2014 News / TCHRD Statements

Joint Statement of World Organisation Against Torture and TCHRD on China

Created in 1985, the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT) is today the main coalition of international non-governmental organisations (NGO) fighting against torture, summary executions, enforced disappearances and all other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. — The World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT) is the main coalition of international non-governmental organisations fighting against torture, summary executions, enforced disappearances and all other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.

Speaking for itself and TCHRD, the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT) read a joint statement (below) during the 25th session of the Human Rights Council condemning the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) failure to sign the optional protocols to the Convention Against Torture and to prevent arbitrary detention, torture, and the killing of prisoners. The statement specifically focused on the gap between the PRC’s rhetoric and its practice. Despite the many well-documented cases, the PRC continues to deny that there is any torture, arbitrary detention, or persecution of human rights defenders.

The joint statement also mentioned the death of Cao Shunli, a human rights defender who died on 14 March 2014 after she was denied medical care while in imprisoned by the PRC. Other NGOs also tried to discuss Cao Shunli’s death and Chinese Human Rights Defenders tried to hold a minute of silence to honor Cao Shunli, who submitted documents on the PRC’s human rights progress to the Human Rights Council before her abduction in September 2013. The PRC was able to delay the session and block the minute of silence.

27/01/2014 News

UN Expert Group must consider deaths caused by detention in Tibet

A 2001 of Geshe Ngawang Jamyang. — A 2001 photo of Geshe Ngawang Jamyang who died in police custody less than a month after his arrest in December 2013.

On 28 January 2014 the Intergovernmental Expert Group on the Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners will meet for four days in Brasilia, Brazil. The United Nations General Assembly created the Expert Group to update the Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners (SMR), which was drafted in the 1950s. The SMR is a set of rules that outline good principles and practices for the treatment of prisoners and management of prison facilities. The SMR allow for variation depending on legal, social, economic, and geographic conditions. The SMR is not legally binding but it has been widely accepted and helped shaped many States’ national legislation, including those of the People’s Republic of China (PRC).

The original SMR prohibited the use of physical punishments and all forms of cruel, inhumane, or degrading treatment. At the meeting in Brazil the Expert Group will consider proposed changes to the SMR that will increase transparency in prisons.[1] The proposed revisions require deaths during detention or soon after of a prisoner be investigated by an impartial body to ensure that the deaths were not caused by prison officials.

In the People’s Republic of China, prisoners are often subjected to physical punishments, torture and cruel, inhumane, and degrading treatment. When Geshe Sonam Phuntsok[2] was sent to prison for initiating a life-long prayer offering for the Dalai Lama, he was a healthy 48-year-old monk. When his family visited him in prison, Geshe Sonam Phuntsok had lost weight, was semiconscious, and was unable to move properly. When he was released five years later, Geshe Sonam Phuntsok was hospitalized. Geshe Sonam Phuntsok’s treatment in prison left his body broken and he died less than three and a half years after his release.

13/01/2014 News

Death in detention: Monk exposes China’s failure to protect Tibetans’ right to life

Nyima Dakpa Kyeri in a photo taken in early 1990s.

Nyima Dakpa Kyeri was a monk at Tawu Nyitso Monastery in Kardze (Ch: Ganzi) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in Sichuan Province. As a monk he studied among other things Tibetan history. Studying Tibetan history showed Nyima Dakpa how life in Tibet had been before the Chinese invasion. His studies took him to a time when Tibet was a strong, powerful empire. When he was not studying, Nyima Dakpa lived in a Tibet subject to Chinese atrocities. Nyima Dakpa had to act and make the disparity between the two known.

Starting in 1998 and into 1999, Nyima Dakpa posted fliers calling for Tibet to be free from the Chinese occupation. He posted seven fliers before he was arrested in Kardze. Then the beatings started. The authorities beat Nyima Dakpa until he thought of them as ‘devils’. They beat him until he confessed to posting the fliers. Then they beat him more. Nyima Dakpa was beaten until he lost consciousness and his leg broke. Then he was sent to Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan Province for sentencing.