The still-unidentified Tibetan man shouted slogans before self-immolating, they said.

“The protester appeared to be a monk,” Yeshe and Tsering said, quoting a source, “but his name and place of origin and other details are not known.”

“He was immediately taken away by soldiers and police,” they said, adding that two other monks were detained in the vicinity.

“Their identities are also unknown,” Yeshe and Tsering said.

The latest incident took place amid a worldwide vigil day called for by the Tibetan exile leader and, if true, would bring to at least 20 the number of Tibetans who have taken their lives to protest Chinese rule since March 2009, according to The New York Times. It also comes just days after three Tibetan livestock herders reportedly lit themselves ablaze in Sichuan’s Seda County.

© Scott Greene for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: self-immolation, Sichuan, Tibet protests
Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

If confirmed, the latest cases would bring the total self-immolations over the past year to 19, an unprecedented wave of self-inflicted violence among the tiny ethnic minority in China, according to scholars. They were also apparently the first by lay people, rather than current or former members of the clergy, suggesting that self-immolation may be gaining popularity as a form of dissent.

The incidents took place Friday in a remote village in Seda County, once a center of Buddhist teaching, but reports did not surface until the weekend because the government has cut Internet and telephone connections to the area, said Tsering Woeser, a Tibetan poet in Beijing.

She said that one of the three men had died and that the other two, believed to be about 30 and 60 years old, were severely injured.

The local party secretary for Seda County disputed the latest reports in a Global Times article published Monday:

“Everything is all right here, although we still have no Internet access,” said Wang, who said there had been rumors saying some Tibetans were going to set themselves on fire, but “it has not happened.”

Zhang Yang, from the publicity department of the Party committee of Sichuan Province, told the Global Times that he has not heard of any self-immolation incidents over this weekend.

Despite claims in official state media that recent unrest between Tibetans and local authorities in Sichuan is no cause for concern, Beijing has put officials on alert ahead of this month’s Tibetan New Year festival. From The Telegraph:

“Officials must put all their efforts into maintaining a stable, unified social situation in our region. They must have a clear head and fully recognise the extreme importance and urgency of the job of maintaining stability,” a Communist Party notice said in the state-run Tibet Daily newspaper.

“Government departments must unstintingly carry out all measures designed to maintain stability, ” the notice ordered.

The diktat did not detail what measures should be deployed to quell any further unrest.

But with the fifth anniversary of the large-scale March 2008 Tibet uprising also looming, the message to strike hard and stamp out any signs of mass revolt was clear.

Meanwhile, the elected leader of Tibet’s government in exile told the Financial Times on Monday that he is worried about a forceful crackdown by the Chinese government:

“The military build-up is increasing rapidly. We have seen pictures of hundreds of convoys filled with paramilitary forces with automatic machine guns moving towards various parts of Tibetan areas,” Lobsang Sangay, the prime minister of the Tibetan government in exile, told the Financial Times on Monday, referring to images sent by sources in the Tibetan region.

“We are really worried that with such a military security build-up and so many guns in the hands of Chinese police and military personnel, we fear the Chinese government is preparing for something very drastic and unforeseen and tragic.”

© Scott Greene for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: crackdown, self-immolation, Sichuan, Tibet protests
Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Tensions have been high in Tibet and Tibetan regions of Sichuan with numerous self-immolations by Tibetans protesting Beijing’s policies and an ongoing crackdown by security forces. Students for a Free Tibet have obtained an audio file that is reportedly a final statement by Lama Soepa, a spiritual teacher and community leader from Golok in the Kham region of Tibet, who died after setting himself on fire on January 8. Listen to the recording here. From SFFT’s translation:

This is the twenty-first century, and this is the year in which so many Tibetan heroes have died. I am sacrificing my body both to stand in solidarity with them in flesh and blood, and to seek repentance through this highest tantric honor of offering one’s body. This is not to seek personal fame or glory.



I am giving away my body as an offering of light to chase away the darkness, to free all beings from suffering, and to lead them – each of whom has been our mother in the past and yet has been led by ignorance to commit immoral acts – to the Amitabha, the Buddha of infinite light. My offering of light is for all living beings, even as insignificant as lice and nits, to dispel their pain and to guide them to the state of enlightenment. I offer this sacrifice as a token of long-life offering to our root guru His Holiness the Dalai Lama and all other spiritual teachers and lamas.



Meanwhile the official Global Times has said in an editorial that there is “no need to sweat over minor unrest” while other official media reports have condemned Western media for “distorting” recent incidents. China Media Project reports that officials have undertaken a “thankfulness education campaign” in Tibet during which local households are provided posters of Communist Party leaders.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Tibet protests
Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

[...]As long as China remains stable as a whole, the specific problems in the border areas can be kept under control. We should have faith in this.

We should also avoid being impatient. It is not us, but people like the aging Dalai Lama who should worry.

As long as we accept the reality that some incidents are inevitable in parts of Chinese society, including Tibet and Xinjiang, much of the air attached to the Dalai Lama’s political power will be squeezed out.

[...]The unrest that the world usually sees hides the firm foundation of stability in Chinese society.

About 80 percent of urban households own their houses, and the social security system is expanding to rural areas. All these are foundations for national stability.

Regardless of the Global Times article’s tranquil tone and characterization of “minor unrest” as inevitable, state-owned media has been pointing fingers in the usual direction to explain the situation. AFP offers summary and commentary on a recent China Daily report:

China has blamed “trained separatists” for a wave of unrest in Tibetan-inhabited areas last week that left at least two people dead and dozens injured, state press reported Wednesday.

[...]“Initial evidence showed that the riots and assaults were well planned beforehand and instigated by trained separatists against the country,” the official China Daily newspaper said, citing the Sichuan government.

It said protesters attacked police stations with stones and molotov cocktails, prompting the police to take action and “defend themselves”.

[...]Tibetans have long chafed under Chinese rule, saying they suffer religious repression and government surveillance, and that their culture is gradually being eroded by an influx of majority Han Chinese into the areas they live in.

Beijing, though, insists that Tibetans enjoy freedom of religious belief and says their lives have been made better by huge ongoing investment into Tibetan-inhabited areas.

An editorial in China Daily accuses the Tibetan Government-in-Exile and the West for exaggerating recent incidents in Sichuan, and suggests that the West should shoulder some of the blame for the unrest:

It is not uncommon for some Western governments and the so-called Tibetan government-in-exile to play up and distort incidents, such as the one last week between the law enforcement forces and local residents in Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province.

[...]“Overseas forces promoting ‘independence for Tibet’ have always fabricated rumors and distorted the truth to discredit the Chinese government with issues involving Tibet,” said Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei.

[...]It is always easier to destroy than to maintain order and build. In today’s world, a handful of extremists have the ability to cause havoc to a region or even a country, never mind the Dalai Lama clique, which cloaks its real agenda behind religion and which is financed and supported by some Western governments and media with their own agenda against China. It is obvious that they are capable of causing trouble now and then in the Tibetan-inhabited regions.

Also see coverage of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile’s response to the unrest in Tibet, and of a school in Qinghai province working to preserve Tibetan language and culture, both via CDT.

© josh rudolph for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: police violence, Tibet protests
Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Faced with the largest outbreak of Tibetan unrest since riots in Lhasa and elsewhere in 2008, the government is taking no chances that the turmoil — which has included Chinese forces firing on and killing some demonstrators — will spread.

Armed soldiers in dun-colored camouflage trooped up and down Wuhouci Hengjie, a tree-shaded lane that is home to two government offices. Police cars, vans and even tow trucks, their red-and-blue light bars flashing, were stationed every 50 to 100 yards. Bands of police officers patrolled the sidewalks; on one corner, they upbraided an angry Tibetan man as anxious women grabbed his arms, pulling him away.

Asked about the heavy security, one shopkeeper sarcastically suggested the forces were in town to prevent rowdiness during the spring festival, a traditional Chinese holiday.

He added quietly: “I don’t dare talk. The police came to my shop and told me not to spread the word.”

While authorities have acknowledged at least one death in the violence, without providing details of who killed whom, they are launching a media campaign to blast “distortions” by the Dalai Lama and his Western supporters. From China Daily:

The clashes caused at least one death and others, including policemen, were injured.

As usual, Western government officials and the self-proclaimed Tibetan government-in-exile spared no effort in taking the opportunity to criticize the Chinese central government.

The London-based Free Tibet advocacy group claimed that police opened fire on Tibetans peacefully protesting against religious repression in the southwestern province of Sichuan, killing at least one and injuring more than 30.

This was refuted by the Chinese Foreign Ministry, which said the true cause of the clash was a mob intent on storming stores and the police station.

“Overseas forces promoting ‘independence for Tibet’ have always fabricated rumors and distorted the truth to discredit the Chinese government with issues involving Tibet,” said Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei.

Meanwhile, political cartoonists in China have taken up the story with some hard-hitting images about the current situation. From Rebel Pepper (变态辣椒):

And from Hexie Farm:

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Sichuan, Tibet protests
Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Chinese authorities shot dead as many as five Tibetans and seriously wounded 40 others on Tuesday in the second day of bloodshed as protests escalated in the troubled Kardze (in Chinese, Ganzi) prefecture in Sichuan province, local sources said.

A crackdown has been launched in Serthar (in Chinese, Seda) county where the incident occurred, with about 40 protesters arrested and all public movements limited, the sources said.

“A kind of martial law has been imposed,” a local resident, calling himself Ganta, told RFA.

“Tibetans are confined to their homes as the Chinese police fire on anyone who ventures outside in the streets,” another local source said.

Meanwhile, reports conflict about how many people were killed in yesterday’s shooting, though Xinhua has acknowledged one death. From AP:

The official Xinhua News Agency cited a Foreign Ministry spokesman as saying Tuesday that one Tibetan was killed and four others injured during Monday’s clash in Luhuo county in southwest China. Hong Lei says order has been restored in the region and that the authorities will act firmly to fight crime.

Witnesses and activist groups said security forces opened fire on protesters and killed as many as three people after several thousand Tibetans marched to government offices.

The International Campaign for Tibet says that three people were killed and provides background on the causes of the protests:

The escalating crackdown in Drango follows the circulation of leaflets in the area saying that Tibetans should not celebrate the New Year in 2012 because of the self-immolations, and declaring an intention by the unnamed author of the leaflets to set fire to themselves at the time of Tibetan New Year (Losar, which falls on February 22).

[...] Tibetans gathered in Drango (Chinese: Luhuo) county town in Kardze (Chinese: Ganzi) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan, at around 12 noon-2 pm today (January 23) following a buildup of tensions in the area. According to Tibetan exile sources in contact with Tibetans in the area, the local authorities tightened control in the area after the dissemination of leaflets. Although full details of circumstances leading up to the protest are not known, several sources said that police had adopted harsh measures to counter the impact of the leaflets, and that this has led to people from the three main nomadic areas of Drango gathering in the town. Tibetans shouted slogans calling for freedom and saying that they could not live under Chinese rule in Tibet.

[...] According to the same sources, when news spread of the protest, Tibetans began to converge upon Drango from different areas including Serthar and Lithang (Chinese: Litang), also in Kardze. There are serious fears of further escalation and military buildup, and concerns for the safety of monks at Drango monastery (the name means literally ‘head of the rock’). Drango is one of the most important and largest monasteries in Kham, situated on a mountain slope at the confluence of two rivers, around 25 kilometers from Kardze town.

Kathleen McLaughlin of Global Post comments on how difficult it is for foreign correspondents to get accurate information about such incidents in Tibetan regions:

And herein lies the crucial problem with reporting on Tibet and getting accruate information. Chinese journalists are constrained by censorship and state-owned media rules. Foreign correspondents require special permits to enter Tibet proper. In cases like this reported violence in a Tibetan area of Sichuan province, journalists are certain to be barred, detained and turned away from reporting on the scene. So how does one verify the facts of what happened in what was certainly a violent outburst in Tibetan parts of Sichuan province?

Many rely on Tibetan groups based outside of China and what contacts they can collect from within the country. China then puts forth its own version of the story. But most often happens, the real truth of events remains clouded in shadows, without independent verification.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: kardze, police violence, Tibet protests
Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Security forces opened fire on Tibetan protesters in western China on Monday, injuring at least 32 people and killing at least one of them in the largest violent confrontation in ethnic Tibetan areas of China since 2008, two Tibetan rights group and the Tibetan exile government said.

[...] The incident on Monday was also the second reported shooting of Tibetan protesters in the past week and a half. The previous incident, on Jan. 14, in which two people were reported wounded, took place in Aba , also located in Sichuan province and 100 miles northeast of Luhuo.

The combination of increasingly frequent confrontations and rising casualties during these incidents, “underlines how the situation is escalating,” said Stephanie Brigden, the director of Free Tibet.

Chinese government agencies were closed on Monday in observance of the first day of lunar new year celebrations. The official Xinhua news agency had no report on the latest incident. Internet access to the area was cut off by the authorities, apparently to slow the dissemination of information.

Radio Free Asia has more details and reports that up to six people may have been killed:

“Today, Jan. 23, many Tibetans began a peaceful protest against Chinese rule at the Draggo (in Chinese, Luhuo) county center,” in the Kardze (in Chinese, Ganzi) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, a Tibetan living in the area said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“At least two Tibetans were shot to death, and over ten were injured,” after Chinese police “violently suppressed the protest,” the source said.

One of the protesters also attempted to set himself ablaze, the source added.

Tibet’s India-based exile government quoted sources saying six had been killed in what it described as “indiscriminate firing” by police.

Read about the other incident in which protesters were reported shot this month, as well as other recent protests by Tibetans including a spate of self-immolations in recent months, via CDT.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: police violence, Tibet protests
Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

It appeared that at least two people had been hit by gunfire, and one of those might have been killed, said Kate Saunders, a spokeswoman for International Campaign for Tibet, which is based in Washington. Ms. Saunders said the group had spoken to at least two sources.

Another group, Free Tibet, said it had confirmed reports that a Tibetan woman was shot. There were unconfirmed reports that many others were also hit, said Stephanie Brigden, the director of the group, which is based in London. Security officials in the area could not be reached for comment on Saturday night.

The violence took place in the town of Aba, known in Tibetan as Ngaba, a focal point for protests against Chinese rule and the scene of civilian deaths during a widespread Tibetan uprising in 2008. Since then, it has been the site of at least 11 self-immolations, some of them fatal. Those setting themselves on fire have mainly been monks, nuns or former members of the clergy. The monks in Aba who set themselves on fire all come from the Kirti Monastery, where anger has grown over Chinese repression of religious practices.

The self-immolation on Saturday was the 16th since March 2011, when Phuntsog, a monk at Kirti, set himself on fire and died. The wave of self-immolations in the past year was preceded by that of one monk from Kirti in the spring of 2009. In total, at least 12 Tibetans have died through self-immolation since 2009, if the death on Saturday is confirmed. Scholars of modern Tibet say the self-immolations represent a new and disturbing protest strategy among the clergy.

AP has more in the incident:

Woeser, a Beijing-based Tibetan poet and activist, posted accounts of the unrest on Twitter that were similar to those reported by the groups.

“A young Tibetan person self-immolated … the local area has erupted in public protests and marches, and they have been met with military police fire and suppression. There are Tibetan casualties,” she wrote. Like some Tibetans, Woeser uses just one name.

The claims could not be independently confirmed. Calls to Aba county’s police bureau rang unanswered. A man who answered the phone Sunday at the Aba prefecture government said they hadn’t received any reports about a self-immolation or clashes and then hung up. People answering the phones at the lower Aba county and township governments also said they had no information.

Heavy security has turned Aba and the surrounding area into a virtual restricted zone since an anti-government uprising across Tibetan communities in 2008, and foreign reporters have had little or no access.

Read more about Kirti Monastery and self-immolation by Tibetans, as well as other recent protests in Tibet and Tibetan regions, via CDT.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Kirti monastery, police violence, self-immolation, Tibet, Tibet protests
Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2011. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Tibet, Tibet protests, video
Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Officials have reason to be fearful. For Tibetans, self-immolation is a new form of protest. Such acts are difficult for the authorities to prevent, and images of them can have a powerful psychological effect among sympathisers. Eleven Tibetans have tried to kill themselves this way since March. Six have succeeded, the latest a 35-year-old nun in Ganzi on November 3rd.

On October 19th Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, held a prayer ceremony for the dead in Dharamsala, the Indian town where he now lives in exile. China’s foreign ministry accused him of inciting “terrorism in disguise”. Fire extinguishers have become the accoutrement of choice for police patrols (see picture) as far away as Lhasa, the Tibetan capital some 1,200km south-west of Songpan.

The anger and desperation that has prompted Tibetans to set fire to themselves is common across the plateau. In all of China’s Tibetan-inhabited areas, the authorities have rounded up innumerable monks, nuns and laypeople for taking part in the 2008 unrest. Reports of torture are rife. Many monks have been forced to denounce the Dalai Lama, who even in Songpan, where things are relatively calm, is deeply revered by Tibetans. This correspondent was often asked for news of him. “You can’t call yourself a monk unless you support the Dalai Lama”, says a Songpan resident.

But Aba and Ganzi share an additional layer of resentment. Both prefectures saw the only well-documented cases of police firing on demonstrators in 2008 (20-30 people may have been shot dead in Aba town). Unlike Songpan county, where monasteries are small and scattered, Aba’s main monastery, called Kirti, is large and central. Monks at Kirti have been particularly prominent in the prefecture’s unrest, and the monastery is now under heavy police guard.

A report in the Guardian reports that such protests are likely to continue and even increase, according to residents of the region:

On Thursday monks who have recently made the perilous journey across the Himalayas to exile in India claimed leaflets were circulating in Tibetan Buddhist monasteries in China listing the names of scores of young people ready to publicly burn themselves alive to protest against Chinese policies .

Senior monks from the Kirti monastery in Aba county, the centre of the protests so far, told the Guardian that they feared it was inevitable many more would die over the coming months.

“I am 100% sure there will be more. The situation is suffocating and there is no other way to demonstrate anger,” said Kanyang Tsering, 32, a monk from Kirti living in Dharamsala.

Exiled leaders of Tibet have been quick to lay the blame at the feet of Chinese policy in the region. The Dalai Lama recently proclaimed what was happening to Tibetans in China, “cultural genocide,” while Lobsang Songay, the new Prime Minister of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile, offered support and compassion for those burning themselves. From Reuters:

Lobsang Sangay, the Harvard educated lawyer who this year replaced the Dalai Lama as the political leader of the exiled Tibetans, said an increased Chinese military presence around monasteries was “undeclared martial law.”

“Once a protest takes place it becomes our sacred duty to show solidarity and support, support for the voice that they raise, so the life that they sacrifice or the torture that they endure do not go in vain,” Sangay told Reuters.

“My duty as a political leader is echo or if possible magnify these voices, with sadness and pain obviously,” he said at his offices in the Himalayan town of Dharamsala in India.

And the Karmapa Lama, another influential high lama living in exile in India, called on protesters to cease the immolations:

The religious head also urged the Chinese leadership to “heed Tibetans’ legitimate demands and to enter into meaningful dialogue with them instead of brutally trying to achieve their silence.”

“The situation is unbearably difficult, but in difficult situations we need greater courage and determination,” said the Karmapa, urging the Tibetans in Tibet to preserve their lives.

According to an AFP report, other Tibetan exiles have mixed feelings on the use of self-immolation as a protest tactic:
.

..Some feel the ends justify the means, others are staunchly opposed to suicide or attempted suicide on religious grounds.

A culture of self-censorship due to heavy Chinese security and restrictions placed on reporters in the remote Himalayan province, make measuring opinion inside Tibet extremely difficult.

Geshey Lobsang, a monk at the monastery of the Dalai Lama in Dharamshala, the Tibetan spiritual leader’s home-in-exile in India, says when it comes to suicide the teachings of Buddhism are ambiguous.

“It is sin to destroy one’s body, but Buddhist philosophy also states that every action should be driven by good motivation and reason,” he told AFP.

The dangerous form of protest seems to be spreading as a Tibetan exile in Kathmandu, Nepal set himself on fire but did not suffer serious injury. Tibetans in India, meanwhile, have been protesting a recent Bollywood film, Rockstar, which blurs an image of the Tibetan flag during one song sequence.

See also: “Immolation, Explosions and Poetry on the Roof of the World” from CDT.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Kirti monastery, self-immolation, Tibet protests
Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall