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At least 120 killed, 190 jailed in Tibet in 2008: report

Tibet Sun newsroom | Tibet Sun

Monks of Labrang Monastery defiantly staging a protest during the government organised foreign media tour to the area on 9 April 2008. The banner says: We have no freedom of speech.File photo/TCHRD/Tibet

Putting the record straight in its annual report, the Tibetan Centre of Human Rights and Democracy (TCHRD) said that the year 2008 was historic for Tibet.

The 49th anniversary of the Tibetan People’s Uprising on 10 March 2008 sparked off an unprecedented magnitude of spontaneous protests against the Chinese government across the Tibetan plateau.

“The pan-Tibet political uprising this past spring is an eruption of popular resentment against the Chinese authorities’ five decades of misrule in Tibet which saw systematic and gross violations of human rights in every sphere of life,” said the annual report of the organisation.

The 168-page report released today said that the subsequent Chinese crackdown of the protests left at least 120 Tibetans killed, many in police firing, and ten died due to torture.

At least 190 Tibetans were handed prison terms ranging from nine months to life imprisonment for individuals as young as 16, and as old as 80. Out of the total sentenced so far, seven received life imprisonment, while 90 Tibetans were sentenced to 10 years or more.

There were about 6500 arrests and over a thousand cases of involuntary or forced disappearance.

The Tibetans have been largely sentenced under the charges of “endangering state security”: a controversial legislation which has never been defined properly, or had its scope of application defined. “The legislation is used as a blanket cover to strike anyone daring to question the state,” the report says.

TCHRD believes that the actual figures could be much larger in light of the magnitude of the uprising in Tibet.

To China and the world the year was a stark reminder that the Tibet issue needs to be urgently resolved. It is clearly evident that the policies designed and ordered from the faraway central government in Beijing have failed miserably in Tibet.

However, the government’s severe blockade of information which is often linked to “leaking state secrets” and punishable by lengthy prison terms under the charge of “endangering state security” for what is a standard practice of reporting human rights violations has enormously stifled the flow of information to the outside world.

In order to avoid international condemnation, the government engaged in a systematic ban on communication channels, and journalists and tourists in all the Tibetan inhabited areas — the so-called “Tibet Autonomous Region” (TAR), Sichuan, Qinghai, Gansu and Yunan. Those arrested for communicating to the outside world have been dealt with severely.

Despite almost 50 years of Chinese misrule in Tibet, the Dalai Lama rules the hearts and minds of the Tibetan people. In all around 300 protests in 90 counties were reported. The protesters called for the return of the Dalai Lama to Tibet. The protests turned violent at some areas with vehicles set on fire, shops burnt and the military hurled with stones. The Dalai Lama called for an immediate end of violence, and warned of resignation if the Tibetans adhered to violence.

China blamed the Dalai Lama for plotting the unrest, a charge he denied. “These protests are a manifestation of the deep-rooted resentment of the Tibetan people under the present governance,” said the Dalai Lama in March 2008. He also asked China to stop using force and address the long-simmering resentment of the Tibetan people through dialogue with the Tibetan people.

The Chinese authorities in a counter measure to quell the protests unleashed the vicious “patriotic education” campaign in order to suppress the Tibetans. The campaign acts as a political tool to humiliate the Tibetans and break down their nationalistic sentiments.

People were forced to condemn the recent protests, denounce the Dalai Lama and pledge allegiance to the Communist Party. The key component of the campaign was the vilification of the Dalai Lama.

Tibetan communist party members and civil servants were served with the issuance of a two-month ultimatum in July to recall their children studying in schools run by the Tibetan government-in-exile in India. Members who fail to do so would be expelled from the party and government jobs. The report said that 24 students have been pulled out of schools in India to return.

The year 2008 recorded the least number of Tibetans refugees escaping Tibet. As against the usual average figure of around two thousand refugees, only 627 Tibetans have managed to arrive in India last year.

Similar or even greater protests than last year could occur in Tibet this year as Tibetans will mark the 50th year of Chinese occupation of Tibet on 10 March.

Copyright © 2009 Tibet Sun

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