The monk set himself on fire Saturday inside his room in Kirti monastery in Sichuan province’s mountainous Aba county, RFA said. Carrying a Tibetan Buddhist prayer flag, he ran toward the monastery entrance before collapsing and was rushed to hospital where he died, the report said.

A man who answered the phone at Kirti said the monastery was open to the public, but hung up when questioned about the self-immolation report. Calls to local government and police offices rang unanswered.

The London-based advocacy group Free Tibet also reported Lobsang Thokmey’s self-immolation. It said a large force of security personnel at the county hospital had removed his body.

Confirming claims long circulating among Tibetan activists, the official Global Times newspaper last week said that family members of those who self-immolate were barred from retrieving their relatives’ bodies, while neighbors were not allowed to offer condolences and monks were barred from offering prayers for the dead.

Phayul provides more details on the monk’s self-immolation:

According to the Dharamshala based Kirti Monastery, Lobsang Thokmey doused his body with kerosene in front of his monastic quarters in the west of the Kirti Monastery and started running towards the east.

“Lobsang Thokmey was in flames as he began running with the Buddhist flag in his hands,” the Kirti Monastery said in a release. “Before he could reach the main gate, he fell on the ground.”

“A large number of Chinese security personnel arrived at the hospital soon after Lobsang Thokmey was admitted and later forcibly took away the deceased’s body to the regional headquarters of Barkham,” the same source said.

It is not yet known what slogans Lobsang Thokmey raised during his self-immolation protest.

Lobsang Thokmey is the 108^th Tibetan to set himself ablaze since the beginning of the protests that began in February 2009. In the 109th case, a Tibetan woman has also self-immolated in Sichuan province’s Ngaba prefecture. These incidents come amid the continuing crackdown in Tibet. From Radio Free Asia:

Kunchok Wangmo, 31, set herself ablaze in Dzoege (Ruo’ergai) county just before midnight last Wednesday but news of the burning was hushed up by Chinese police who had grabbed her body, cremated it and handed over the remains to her family, the sources said.

Her husband, Dolma Kyab, was detained when he refused to comply with an order by the Chinese authorities who wanted to blame the self-immolation on a family squabble, one exiled Tibetan with contacts in the region told RFA’s Tibetan Service.

Kunchok Wangmo is the 15th woman to self-immolate since the burnings began in February 2009 aimed at challenging Chinese rule in Tibetan areas and calling for the return of Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, who lives in exile in India.

The main road in Ngaba was declared last year as “Heroes Street” after it became the epicenter of the burnings.

See also Flames of Protest: The History of Self-Immolation, via CDT.

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Tsezung Kyab, 27, torched himself in front of the main prayer hall of the Shitsang Monastery in Luchu region of eastern Tibet at around 1:30 pm (local time). He passed away at his protest site, the same place where his cousin Pema Dorjee, 23, passed away in his self-immolation protest on December 8, 2012.

[…] This is the second self-immolation protest in Tibet in as many days. [On Sunday], Phagmo Dhondup, a Tibetan in his 20’s set himself ablaze near the Jhakhyung Monastery in Palung region of eastern Tibet. His condition and whereabouts are not known.

On Tuesday, news emerged of another case on Monday, in Ngaba. From Phayul:

Sangdag, a monk of the Dhiphu Monastery, set himself ablaze on a main road in Ngaba district at around 10 am (local time).

According to the exile base of Kirti Monastery in Dharamshala, Sangdag’s present condition is unknown.

“Soon after Sangdag carried out his fiery protest, Chinese security personnel arrived at the scene and doused the flames on his body,” Kirti Monastery said in a release today. “He was taken a hospital in Ngaba but shortly after that the Chinese police bundled him away to another place.”

These protests brought the total number of Tibetan self-immolations within China to 107 since the start of 2009. Six other cases have occurred in India and Nepal, while two further incidents in Sichuan province are disputed on the grounds that they may have been accidental. The International Campaign for Tibet publishes perhaps the clearest and most comprehensive list of Tibetan self-immolations, though at time of writing it has not yet been updated to include Sangdag’s.

Another report from Phayul last week illustrated the risks faced by anyone suspected of sharing information about the protests. A 20-year-old Tibetan man was reportedly sentenced to two years in prison after two photographs of self-immolations were found on his phone, along with other images:

“He was apprehended by Chinese security personnel during a routine check near the city mosque,” the release cited a Tibetan source as saying. “Upon checking his mobile phone, the Chinese police found two photos of self-immolation protests, images of Tibetan national flag, and other photos showing Chinese atrocities on Tibetans.”

The release added that he was kept in various prisons for over a week during which he was constantly interrogated. Topden was later sentenced to two years in prison on charges of being a “reactionary, inciting the public, and threatening social stability.” He is currently being kept in a prison in Toelung region.

[…] In December last, four Tibetans were arrested in Rebkong region of eastern Tibet on similar charges of storing “reactionary” materials in the phone after they were found keeping photos of His Holiness the Dalai Lama in their phones.

This is just the latest in a string of sentences passed on people accused of involvement in the protests. The crackdown is also said to have included confiscation of TV equipment, restrictions on travel, withdrawal of government benefits from families of self-immolators, and beatings and arrests.

Over the longer term, China has attempted to secure its rule over Tibetan areas with economic development. Xinhua’s China View reported the official removal of 130,000 people from poverty in the Tibetan Autonomous Region last year, pointing to long-distance trucking as a key driver of prosperity:

At The New York Times’ Latitude blog, Clarissa Sebag-Montefiore acknowledged that Tibet has seen some material gains. But the settlement of nomadic herders has been a core policy to “raise living standards”, and this, she writes, has left many with government stipends and alcohol in place of traditional livelihoods and communities.

The Chinese government has […] undermined Tibetan nomads’ claim to land by ordering the fencing of private pastures and resettling populations, often forcibly. Since that campaign started in the 1990s — accelerating over the last decade — more than one million Tibetan herders across the Tibetan Autonomous Region and Tibetan-populated regions of western China have been resettled. According to the state-run China Daily, the government spent almost $550 million from 2009 to 2012 on the resettlement of Tibetan nomads in Qinghai.

Herders have traded their livestock and their lifestyle for a small annual stipend. They often relocate to compounds in town — like the colorful ones I saw — where local officials can monitor their activities more easily. “People who live in these houses look at it like a jail,” one young Tibetan told me. “The community is gone.”

What’s left of it is being turned into a social underclass. Many older Tibetan nomads are illiterate, and aside from irregular construction work there is little they can find to support themselves once their stipend runs out. Those who cannot speak Chinese complain of being treated with contempt; they say shopkeepers of ethnic Han origin order them not to touch produce.

NPR’s Talk of the Nation (via CDT) recently hosted a discussion of past and present self-immolations with Columbia University’s Robert Barnett, Oxford University’s Michael Biggs and the International Campaign for Tibet’s Bhuchung Tsering. A blog post translated at High Peaks Pure Earth, on the other hand, offers a glimpse of the ongoing debate on the Tibetan web. Its author, Naktsang Nulo, dismisses the accusation that any but the youngest and most impressionable self-immolators could have been fooled into committing such an act, but implores others not to follow their lead and urges the Dalai Lama to issue a similar appeal.

What I want to state and request again and again from my heart and mind with deep sadness is that no matter what savage and brutal rule you may have to endure, please do not resort to self-immolation. You may come up with any other methods of resistance and struggle, but please do not set yourself on fire. I want to request again that no matter how pure your aims and hopes are, please do not resort to self-immolation.

[…] There are many ways to fight for freedom, to fulfill one’s aspirations and to struggle against the government. At a time when there is a so-called good leadership of the Communist Party, good governance from the administration, good economic development and good livelihood for the people, it seems that an individual, a group of people or a nationality can demand rights from the government, regional authorities or even the Communist Party by submitting appeals and through legal channels. It appears that one may not necessarily have to resort to self-immolation. Perhaps these are just the words of someone like me who does not know much. But what I want to request again is that no matter what savage and brutal rule you may have to endure, please do not set yourself on fire. Whatever methods of struggle and resistance one must adopt, do not resort to self-immolation. No matter how pure and incomparable your hopes and faiths are please do not set yourself on fire. I particularly want to request our root guru, His Holiness the Dalai Lama, to pray for the sea of suffering in Tibet and kindly make a statement to ask the brave Tibetans not to self-immolate.

In an iSunAffairs Weekly article translated and republished at Phayul, New York-based political science professor Ming Xia examined the question of whether such a call would be effective or desirable. Xia’s primary focus, however, was the lack of support for Tibetans among Han intellectuals in China, which Andrew Jacobs also examined at The New York Times in November. The two groups face shared obstacles, Xia argued, but many Chinese fail to recognize this because of state propaganda or revulsion at the act of self-immolation viewed from a non-Buddhist perspective.

First as intellectuals living in the free world, we must be aware of the fact that the Chinese intellectuals and Tibetans are victims of the same authoritarian rule and that they are both facing a profound identity crisis. It raises a fundamental question for Tibetans, which is whether Tibetans would continue to be Tibetans if there were no Buddhism. And as for the Chinese intellectuals, the question is whether they would still be “intellectuals” if they do not have the right to free and independent thinking and the right to pursue truth. Since the two challenges are closely interlinked, it is therefore incumbent upon the Chinese intellectuals to pay close attention and support the demand of the Tibetan people.

[…] No doubt, resorting to self-immolation is not a good option. Tibetans today, however, do not have the luxury to choose between “good” and “bad”. Tibetans can only chose between “bad” and “worse.” Losing their religious faith is worse than self-immolation for Tibetans. The Chinese Communist regime wantonly insult the Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, ban his portrait to be hung in the temples, expel the monks devoted to the Dalai Lama from their monasteries, establish “Temple Management Authority” and “Work Units” in the monasteries, and send millions of copies of the so-called “four leaders” (Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin, and Hu Jintao) to the temples. All of this represents a serious threat to the religious freedom of the Tibetan people.

[This post was edited to remove a link to an outdated NPR story.]

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According to the exile base of the Kirti Monastery in Dharamshala, Lobsang Namgyal set himself ablaze near the local police building in Zoege at around 6 am (local time). He passed away at the scene of his protest.

“Lobsang Namgyal, engulfed in flames, shouted slogans for the long life of His Holiness the Dalai Lama as he ran towards the local police building,” Kirti Monastery said in a release citing sources in the region.

[…] “Chinese security personnel bundled away his body from the site and carried out his cremation without informing his family members,” Kirti Monastery said. “Only his ashes were handed over.”

In September 2012, Lobsang Namgyal had all of a sudden gone missing for two weeks prompting frantic searches from his family members and friends. It was later found out that he was taken into custody by Chinese security personnel for unknown reasons.

Coincidentally or otherwise, news of this 100th self-immolation emerged on the 100th anniversary of the Dalai Lama’s Tibetan Proclamation of Independence, after a ten-day delay. The organization Free Tibet reported that fear of reprisals from Chinese authorities had slowed confirmation of the event, and that Lobsang Namgyal’s family members have been followed and subjected to phone tapping or detention since his death. Authorities have detained dozens of Tibetans accused of involvement in earlier protests, while others have already received lengthy prison sentences. Other measures include travel restrictions and the confiscation of televisions and satellite dishes, aimed at controlling the flow of information: the delayed news of Lobsang Namgyal’s death, and reports that a Tibetan woman set fire to herself in Beijing in a previously unknown case as long ago as last September, suggest some success in this.

The protests and crackdown have dampened celebrations of Losar, the Tibetan lunar new year, which Tibetan prime-minister-in-exile Lobsang Sangay suggested should be marked by prayer instead of festivities. From Ben Blanchard at Reuters:

The Tibetan lunar new year is supposed to be a time for celebration, but many Tibetans who spoke to Reuters in Xiahe said there would be no entertainment this year.

“It really isn’t appropriate because of the self-immolations. So we’re not marking the new year,” said a Tibetan man who gave his name as Dorje. “In Tibet you don’t celebrate new year if you are in mourning.”

[…] Tibetan areas in China have been largely closed to foreign reporters and put under heavy security, making an independent assessment of the situation there hard.

Many of the monks said they were too scared to talk publicly about the Tibet issue. “I’m terrified. People have no idea how bad things are here,” said one monk.

The Associated Press described the self-immolation in Kathmandu on Wednesday:

Witnesses in Nepal said a man in monk’s robes entered a cafe in Katmandu’s Boudhanath district–home to many Tibetan Buddhist temples and monasteries–and asked to use the bathroom. After spending some time there, he went into the street and lit himself on fire. He ran a few steps, covered in flames and chanting slogans against China, before collapsing in front of the mammoth Boudhanath stupa, one of the holiest Buddhist sites in the country, surrounded by prayer wheels and decorated with colorful streams of flitting prayer flags.

Police official Keshav Adhikari said police and residents were able to put out the flames and rush the man to a hospital. Dozens of baton-wielding police surrounded the hospital where the man lay in critical condition. Adhikari said the man had yet to be identified, but appeared to be about 21 years old.

[…] Prasant Tamang, a waiter at the Golden Eye Cafe, said he found a gasoline bottle, a jacket and a bag in the cafe’s bathroom. Tamang said the man appeared normal and calm.

Some 20,000 Tibetan exiles live in Nepal, but some say they feel “suffocated” by growing Chinese influence. Local authorities have forbidden protests against China, and in February last year border guards reportedly turned a blind eye to plain-clothed Chinese men obstructing a CNN crew filming on the Nepalese side.

The Kathmandu protest has also been described as the 100th self-immolation, but officials from the Central Tibetan Administration told the AP that it was the 101st worldwide since 2009. This figure appears not to include Lobsang Namgyal. The International Campaign for Tibet counts five previous cases outside China’s borders since April 2008, including one earlier incident in the same part of Kathmandu. Two more possible cases within Tibet are excluded from both organizations’ tallies because accidental death could not be definitively ruled out.

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Growing unrest in Qinghai province in recent months apparently is worrying local leaders. Earlier self-immolations had been largely concentrated in the adjacent province of Sichuan. The uptick in tensions in Tibetan portions of Qinghai suggests deepening distrust of local party leaders. Tibetans activists lament what they describe as forced cultural assimilation, political and religious repression and environmental degradation as some of the problems that underlay the self-immolations and wider unrest across the region.

Authorities in Huangnan are also pledging to “block harmful outside information,” according to Thursday’s state media report. It said authorities had already begun dismantling satellite and other equipment used to broadcast overseas programming. Authorities described the programming—much of it produced with the backing of Western governments—as “anti-Chinese” and vowed to increase access to Chinese state-backed programming instead.

Reuters reports that 300 monasteries have been affected by the TV seizures:

The government in Huangnan said its approach in tackling self-immolations comprised of “guiding public opinion on the Dalai issue”, increasing patrols and “blocking outside harmful information”, according to the news agency, which is managed by the Qinghai government.

“At this critical moment for maintaining social stability in Huangnan prefecture … (we must) strengthen measures and fully fight the special battle against self-immolations,” the article said.

“We do not know anything about it,” an official from the Huangnan prefecture government told Reuters by telephone, when asked to confirm the report, before hanging up.

The efforts to guide public opinion have included a series of articles and videos distributed abroad through blocked services like Twitter and YouTube. A representative China Daily article, ‘Monks vent anger at self-immolation‘, stressed the effects of self-immolations on local businesses, shocked passers-by, and scarred and reportedly repentant survivors, whom it portrayed as innocent dupes of the Dalai Lama and his manipulative and villainous agents:

People used to gather and watch the acts of self-immolation, but now the act has been disguised, said Ngarnang, director of Aba county’s information office. “We have seen a trend whereby the location of these acts has moved from the county seat to the countryside, because it is less public. After all, the Dalai Lama and his followers just need the photographs and videos to use in their propaganda campaign. They know they won’t get any support from the local people.”

[…] Lorang Konchok took advantage of his position as a Geshe, a name given to monks who hold an exclusive degree in Buddhist studies. He told local monks and followers that self-immolation was not against Buddhist doctrine and that those who performed the act were “heroes”.

However, he admitted that he had no intention of becoming a “hero” himself. “I won’t self-immolate because I am scared of the pain,” said Lorang Konchok at the detention center in Aba prefecture in early December. “I didn’t regard them (self-immolators) as heroes until two other monks, Samdam and Dorah, told me so. They also told me they could help publicize those who set themselves on fire.”

[…] Police later discovered that Lorang Konchok was behind five other acts of self-immolation this year, including that of a young man who also took his own life in March. Two people were also forced to flee their hometown to avoid Lorang Konchok, who harassed them and urged them to commit self-immolation. They did not return to their homes until Lorang Konchok and Lorang Tsering were apprehended by the police.

Facts about the self-immolations in Tibetan Areas of Ngapayoutube.com/watch?v=ID1hI5…

— Xinhua News Agency (@XHNews) December 26, 2012

See more on Tibetan self-immolations via CDT.

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“Sangay Tashi, 18, set himself on fire at around 12 midnight Tuesday, November 27 in Sangkhog town,” an exiled Tibetan monk Sonam told Phayul citing contacts in the region. “He passed away at the site of his protest.”

[…] Sangay Tashi arrived in Sangkhog town earlier that day with his friends. Before setting himself on fire, he reportedly called one of his relatives and told him that he had decided to set himself on fire for the cause of Tibet. Before his relative could carry on the conversation, Sangay Tashi hung up the phone and switched it off.

By the time Sangay Tashi’s family members arrived in Sangkhog, he had already carried out his self-immolation protest.

Sonam, an exile Tibetan living in Switzerland, told Phayul that Tsegyu set himself ablaze at around 7pm (local time) on November 7, in Tingser village of Bekar town in Driru (Ch: Biru) region of Nagchu, in an apparent protest against China’s continued occupation of Tibet.

[…] Confirming the reports, Dharamshala based rights group Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy in a release today said Tsegyu received no medical treatment while in detention at a local police station in Nagchu.

“For less than two weeks, from November 7 to 18, Tsegyal received no treatment for his burns while being held at the local police station in Nagchu town,” TCHRD said citing sources. “Tsegyal died in the evening of November 18 in police custody.”

Heavy restrictions on journalists in Tibetan areas make independent verification of these reports difficult or impossible. As Kristin Jones wrote at the Committee to Protect Journalists in February, “by preventing reporters from doing their jobs, Chinese officials all but guarantee that activists are the ones reporting the news.”

The Associated Press’ Christopher Bodeen examined the protests’ tactics and escalation, and Beijing’s uncertain response.

“I think the problem will just escalate over time. The government shows no inclination to respond positively to recommendations for reform from the outside or Tibetans,” said Michael Davis, a law professor and expert on Tibet at the University of Hong Kong.

[…] The surge in self-immolations represents an awareness of the impact they are having among the Tibetan community and internationally, said Robbie Barnett, a Tibet expert at New York’s Columbia University. That would likely inspire further protests, increasing the numbers of Tibetans willing to take their lives for the sake of their community, he said.

[…] While local authorities have cracked down hard following the self-immolations and other protests, authorities in Beijing have said relatively little other than to issue routine denunciations of the Dalai Lama and his followers. That indicates they are uncertain how to respond in a way that would bolster their authority and prevent the acts of defiance snow-balling into a full-blown protest movement, Barnett said.

U.S. ambassador to China Gary Locke discussed the self-immolations with CNN’s Christiane Amanpour on Tuesday:

Christiane Amanpour: We want to know from your perspective whether the new leader Xi Jinping will be any different on Tibet, for instance, because there have been many burnings by ethnic Tibetans, another four reported just today in China; I know you’ve met with some ethnic Tibetans. What do you think is the prospect for any different kind of relationship, Ambassador?

Gary Locke: Well, we’re just going to have to wait and see, but obviously the United States is very concerned about the situation, the heightened tensions in the Tibetan areas, the deplorable self-immolations and of course just the policies of the Chinese government at all levels. And we’re publicly and privately constantly urging the Chinese to re-examine some of their policies that threaten the linguistic identity, cultural identity, and religious identity of the Tibetan people.

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Wangyal:

The young Tibetan man has been identified as Wangyal, a student of Sertha People’s Middle School.

[...]
Wangyal’s condition and whereabouts are not yet known although eyewitnesses say his entire body was engulfed in flames and he could have suffered major injuries.

Wangyal is around 20 years of age and an orphan. He has three brothers and one sister.

Sangay Dolma:

Sources tell Phayul that Sangay Dolma, a nun, passed away in her self-immolation protest in front of the Chinese government office in Dokarmo town of Tsekhog, Malho, eastern Tibet. The exact time of her self-immolation protest could not be ascertained immediately.

Sangay Dolma’s nunnery is located near Sangag Mindrol Dhargeyling Monastery.

According to various sources, a large number of local Tibetans gathered to carry out the last rites of Sangay Dolma.

Kunchok Tsering:

Kunchok Tsering, 18, passed away in his self-immolation protest today in Amchok region of Labrang, eastern Tibet. He carried out his protest near a mining site in the region, the same place where Tsering Dhondup, 35, father of three, passed away in his fiery protest on November 20.

According to reports, monks of the Amchok Monastery and a large number of local Tibetans are currently gathered at the deceased’s home to offer prayers.

Kunchok Tsering is survived by his wife, Sangay Tso, 19 and parents Phagkyab, 40 and Gonpo Tso, 37, and an elder brother.

Gonpo Tsering:

A group of exile Tibetans from Luchu identified the Tibetan self-immolator as Gonpo Tsering, 24 years of age and father of three children, all below the age of six.

“Martyr Gonpo Tsering set himself on fire in front of the main prayer hall of the Ala Deu-go Monastery in Ala region of Luchu at around 6 pm (local time) today,” the group told Phayul citing sources in the region. “While engulfed in flames, he raised slogans calling for Tibet’s freedom, human rights in Tibet, and the return of His Holiness the Dalai Lama from exile.”

Gonpo Tsering succumbed to his injuries at the site of his protest.

After today’s self-immolation, students were photographed holding a banner in solidarity with the deceased:

PHOTO: Tibetan students stand in solidarity after #immolation in Kham, Tibet. “In good and bad times” twitter.com/TsampaRevolt/s…

— Tsampa Revolution (@TsampaRevolt) November 26, 2012

Human Rights in China has translated selected Twitter posts by Chinese commenting on the self-immolations.

RangzenAlliance has published a map of all self-immolations up to November 22. As the number of self-immolations escalates, authorities in Tibet have vowed to intensify a crackdown on separatism. From AFP:

On Saturday Sichuan Communist Party head Wang Dongming called for a further intensification of the crackdown in a speech in Aba, the provincial government said on its website.

“Our struggle with the Dalai (Lama) splittist clique is long-term, arduous and complicated. In fighting separatism and upholding stability we can never relax our work in the slightest,” Wang said.

“We must strengthen and be innovative in accordance with law in our management of the monasteries and unite the people in the common task to fight separatism and maintain stability.”

The Tibetan government-in-exile in the northern Indian hill town of Dharamshala has expressed “deep concern over the alarming escalation in self-immolations by Tibetans inside Tibet”.

Meanwhile, in Gonghe (Chabcha), Qinghai, several students were reportedly severely injured when police cracked down on a protest at a medical school. First-hand reports of the protest and subsequent crackdown are scant but exile groups have pieced together some details. From the Dharamsala-based Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy:

On 26 November, at around 9 am (local time), the protest erupted after ten-point questionnaire was distributed among the students at the medical school in Chabcha town of Serchen County in Tsolho (Ch: Hainan) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Qinghai Province.

The questionnaire required students to fill up answers to ten questions such as “What is the nature of self-immolation?” and “What are the consequences of illegal demonstrations and gatherings?”

The questionnaire also asked, “Will bilingual education system weaken the language and letters of nationalities?” or whether there was “a conflict between protection of traditional system and modern development?” Students were also required to answer such trap questions as “Under whose leadership the equality of nationalities became a reality?”

While explaining the contents of the questionnaire, students were given lectures, which included offensive remarks and baseless allegations against the so-called “Dalai splittist clique.”

The protest began as students called for “equality of nationalities”, “language freedom”, “respect for truth”, and the “establishment a new government”, sources told TCHRD quoting local Tibetans in the area.

And from the Guardian:

Free Tibet said more than 20 of the youths were taken to hospital after a demonstration by 1,000 students, mostly from the Chabcha Sorig Lobling school in Gonghe, known to Tibetans as Chabcha, in Qinghai province. It believed four of the patients required emergency treatment.

[...]

Free Tibet said it was unclear what had happened after security forces arrived at the student protest. It added that the authorities had sealed off the area and barred parents and residents from contacting those inside the school, citing unnamed sources.

The reports could not be verified independently.

The following photos, of the document distributed to students which sparked the protests, and of protest banners in Gonghe, are being distributed online:

From @TsampaRevolt:

VOA has footage of the protest:

Read more about Tibetan self-immolations via CDT.

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Tibetan media sources identified the woman as Tenzin Dolma, aged 23 and a resident of Tsenmo Goge village in Rebgong, the county in which most of the recent self-immolations have taken place.

[...] Separately,  a young man named Khambum Gyal set himself on fire and died near the Rongwo monastery in Rebgong’s Dowa township, sources said.

[...] In a statement on Thursday, London-based Free Tibet director Stephanie Brigden said that Chinese authorities have blocked detailed news of protests in the Rebgong area.

“It may seem particularly important for China to banish any hint of instability during announcements of the new generation of leaders, hence the stringent efforts to block communications to and from Rebgong,” Brigden said.

The article also says that Tibetans in exile are hoping that leaders of other countries urge China’s new leaders to restore rights to Tibetans. See also an op-ed by Lobsang Sangay, the Prime Minister of the Tibetan government-in-exile, in the Wall Street Journal titled, “Tibet Is the Test of China’s Rise.”

See also a notice posted in Rebkong market announcing new security measures. Read more on Tibetan self-immolations via CDT.

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IN A recent posting on her blog, Tsering Woeser accused the authorities in Lhasa of carrying out racial segregation, welcoming Han Chinese visitors to the Tibetan capital but not Tibetans. “Has the world forgotten its boycott of governments that practised apartheid?” she fumed. As a chronicler of repression in Tibet, Ms Woeser has long been China’s most daring voice online, and a very rare one.

Ms Woeser’s dogged determination, despite close surveillance by security agents in Beijing where she lives with her (Han Chinese) husband, has kept open a rare window on conditions in Tibetan-inhabited areas. These have been largely off-limits to foreign journalists since riots in Lhasa in 2008. The 46-year-old writer scours the social media for titbits of news from the plateau, passing them on through her blog, “Invisible Tibet”, or on Twitter. Her postings are in Chinese, which has helped to raise awareness among non-Tibetans.

[...]The police often contact Ms Woeser to make their displeasure known. At politically sensitive times, she and her husband, Wang Lixiong, himself a Tibetologist and outspoken dissident, are sometimes kept under virtual house arrest. Yet Ms Woeser, who worked for a state-owned publication in Lhasa before falling foul of the authorities in 2004 because of her politically edgy writings, is undeterred. She also uses China’s home-grown version of Twitter, Sina Weibo, to post messages under a pseudonym. Several times, Ms Woeser says, censors have shut down her accounts.

Woeser’s electronic activism fills an informational gap that the Committee to Protect Journalists has noted may be created by Beijing’s policies, as “placing travel restrictions on journalists may have one unintended effect. It means that when it comes to unofficial news from China, activists and advocacy groups play a vital role in collecting and disseminating information.”

While microblogging platforms have been a boon for China’s nascent civil society, a recent analysis of Weibo revealed that Tibet and other areas populated with ethnic minorities experience relatively higher rates of censorship.

See the “‘City Moats’ and ‘Apartheid’” [‘护城河’与’种族隔离‘], the post referred to in The Economist article, or browse Woeser’s “Invisible Tibet” blog or Twitter stream [both zh] in their entirety. Stay tuned to the High Peaks Pure Earth for English translations of her posts. Also see prior CDT coverage of Woeser.

© josh rudolph for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: cyberdissidents, digital culture, dissidents, self-immolations, Tibet, Tibetan protests, Woeser
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The man, in his 20’s, shouted slogans in support of Tibet’s spiritual leader the Dalai Lama as he staged the fiery protest in the seat of Damshung county (in Chinese, Dangxiong) in Lhasa prefecture on Saturday.

“He did it around 1 p.m. on July 7 in front of an old community hall in Damshung. He was able to walk about 100 meters (110 yards) with his body on fire before falling down,” a source in Lhasa city told RFA, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“He called for the long life of His Holiness the Dalai Lama,” the source said.

In an interview with The Hindu’s Ananth Krishnan, the Dalai Lama  insisting that he should remain “neutral” on the protests amid growing discomfort from many other Tibetans. He also discussed India’s relationship with China and Tibet, the question of his successor, and why he continues to advocate genuine autonomy rather than independence.

Following the immolations, more people may be aware of problems, but on the other hand, some Tibetan poets and writers have expressed a concern that young Tibetans must be encouraged to cherish their life and not give it away. Do you share their view?

This is a very, very delicate political issue. Now, the reality is that if I say something positive, then the Chinese immediately blame me. If I say something negative, then the family members of those people feel very sad. They sacrificed their own life. It is not easy. So I do not want to create some kind of impression that this is wrong. So the best thing is to remain neutral. Right from the beginning, when this sort of event happened, what I said, and still I am insisting, is this is not happening due to alcohol or family quarrels.

Now the Chinese government must carry thorough research, what is the cause of this, and not pretend that nothing is wrong. Like [former Chinese leader] Hu Yaobang said in the early 1980s when he came to Lhasa, he publicly apologised about what they had done, the past mistakes. He promised they would follow a more realistic policy. Now for that kind of courage, that kind of spirit, the time has come.

Do you still have the belief that a solution to the Tibetan issue could be found within the Chinese Constitution, for meaningful autonomy?

That is the only way, the only realistic way. Number one, many Tibetans inside Tibet want independence, but according to the circumstance, the Dalai Lama supports the Middle Way approach, which is the best, realistic way. I have met, personally, quite a number of Tibetan intellectuals, some old, some young, and they all express to me they fully realise that our approach is the best approach.

Update: In a letter to The Hindu, the press secretary of China’s embassy in New Delhi retorts that the Dalai Lama’s comments “amount to encouragement” of self-immolation, accusing him also of secretly plotting independence and “muddying the waters with regard to reincarnation”.

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Post tags: Dalai Lama, Dharamsala, hu yaobang, India, lhasa, self-immolations, Tibet, Tibet independence, tibet politics, tibetan buddhism, Tibetan independence, Tibetan protests
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On Saturday, the state-run news media sought to equate the Dalai Lama, a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, with the Nazis and their genocidal war on European Jews.

“The remarks of the Dalai Lama remind us of the cruel Nazis during the Second World War,” it said, adding, “How similar it is to the Holocaust committed by Hitler on the Jews!”

It also called him a “tricky liar skilled in double-dealing.”

The comments referred to past statements in which the Dalai Lama condemned policies that encouraged Han Chinese migration to Tibetan areas and others that favored Chinese-language instruction over Tibetan in predominately Tibetan schools.

The commentary continued to claim that the Dalai Lama is trying divide China, but the Dalai Lama has claimed that his goal is more autonomy within China. The Guardian adds:

An official of the Tibetan government-in-exile based in Dharmsala, India, said the Dalai Lama had stated that he did not support self-immolation. “We are concerned about China shifting the blame on the Dalai Lama, making him the scapegoat, rather than correcting their own repressive policies,” said Dicki Choyang, minister of the exile government’s Department of Information and International Affairs.

One activist group, the London-based Free Tibet, released a video on Friday of one of the most recent self-immolations, showing the death of Sonam Thargyal, a 44-year-old farmer who doused himself with kerosene before setting himself alight earlier this month.

Dicki Choyang, of the exiled government, said China’s description of the population proposal was “totally misleading”. The proposal “never suggested removing established communities but advised preventing a massive transfer in the future”, she said.

Read more about the Tibet protests and the Dalai Lama via CDT.

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Post tags: Dalai Lama, Tibet, tibet politics, tibetan government-in-exile, Tibetan protests
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Zhang, speaking with McCain on a panel at the high-level Munich security conference, dismissed his comments about a looming Chinese Arab Spring as “no more than fantasy” and condemned foreign interference in Chinese internal affairs.

McCain, who ran for president against Barack Obama in 2008, told Zhang in front of an audience of ministers, diplomats and security officials: “It is a matter of concern when Tibetans are burning themselves to death because of the continued repression of the Tibetan people in your country.”

“I have said on many occasion and I will say again the Arab Spring is coming to China as well.”

Zhang responded by calling McCain’s claim “more than a fantasy,” and expressed China’s resentment of any lecturing on how to govern within its borders. While the two reportedly shook hands at the end of the panel, reports in China’s state media painted a less rosy picture of the exchange. From Shanghaiist:

The two apparently shook hands at the end of the meeting as McCain told Zhang, “I hope you didn’t interpret my remarks as anything other than the advocacy that I and others hold for every nation in the world, including yours.”

Back home, a report by People’s Daily described the confrontation as being “full of gunpowder smell”, and McCain as “aggressive”, notes the South China Morning Post.

“China has implemented different policies from those implemented in the West Asian and North African nations. China is different from those nations because the policies and governance of the country have the overwhelming support of the people,” the paper quoted Zhang as saying.

© Scott Greene for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Arab Spring, John McCain, Munich, Tibetan protests
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