Geneva: A new United Nations report has issued one of the clearest warnings to date that Chinese state policies in Tibet are actively eroding the foundations of Tibetan civilisation, threatening the survival of Tibetans as a distinct people.

The findings appear in a report to the UN Human Rights Council by the Special Rapporteur on minority issues, Nicolas Levrat. While global in scope, the report explicitly identifies Tibet as a case where state-led policies are not merely discriminatory but constitute what the UN expert describes as “eradication in more subtle ways.”

At the centre of this warning is China’s vast boarding school system imposed on Tibetan children. The report states unequivocally that “the boarding school education system implemented by China in Tibet is aimed at erasing the Tibetan language and identity.” Tibetan children are separated from their families and communities and educated in environments where Mandarin Chinese, state ideology, and cultural assimilation dominate daily life. According to the report, this policy prevents “the intergenerational transmission of cultural, linguistic or religious elements of minorities’ identities,” a process that leads to “the extinction of the minority as a distinct group in the State population.”

The Special Rapporteur makes clear that eradication does not require mass killing to meet the threshold of grave human rights violations. He warns that targeting a people’s language, culture, and religion can be just as destructive as physical violence. Such practices, the report states, violate article 27 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which guarantees minorities the right to enjoy their culture, practice their religion, and use their language in community with others.

These policies are not isolated, but part of a broader political project. The report notes that China has “since 2012 undertaken a nation-building process” that has resulted in “the marginalisation of minority communities,” leading to “forms of severe discrimination against non-Han minorities, such as Tibetans.” Despite constitutional guarantees of regional autonomy, the report finds that in practice Tibetan identity is being subordinated to a single state-defined national identity.

Religious life — a cornerstone of Tibetan civilisation — is also described as being under systematic pressure. The report explains that “all religious groups are required to register through State-controlled ‘patriotic’ religious associations,” and that communities refusing to comply are “denied legal status, criminalised and subjected to surveillance and the closure of places of worship.” For Tibetan Buddhists, this framework places monasteries, religious education, and spiritual authority under direct state control.

The report further highlights restrictions on ethnic and cultural organisations in China, noting that limits on minority associations undermine the ability of Tibetans to organise collectively and protect their culture. Such restrictions, it says, directly interfere with the right of minorities to exercise their identity “in community with the other members of their group.”

Crucially, the Special Rapporteur condemns assimilation policies that offer equality only on the condition that minorities abandon who they are. Such approaches, the report states, are “contrary to the principle” that states must recognise “the existence and identity of persons belonging to a minority.”

For Tibetans, the report’s message is stark. What is taking place is not merely social change or development policy, but a sustained assault on the foundations of a civilisation — its language, its spiritual institutions, its cultural memory, and its transmission to future generations. The report warns that unless these policies are reversed, the damage to Tibetan civilisation may become irreversible.

Appreciating the important UN report from the Special Rapporteur on Minorities, Thinlay Chukki, Representative of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Tibet Bureau Geneva, noted that “this UN report confirms what Tibetans have been warning for years: China’s policies in Tibet are not about development, but about erasing a civilisation. When the state separates Tibetan children from their families and suppresses our language, religion, and culture, it is attacking the very foundations of who we are as a people. The Special Rapporteur is clear that destroying intergenerational transmission of identity amounts to eradication, even when it is carried out quietly and administratively. The international community must recognise this for what it is and act urgently to protect the survival of Tibetan civilisation.”

– Report filed by Tibet Bureau Geneva

The white dome of Boudhanath rises like a silent guardian over the chaotic sprawl of Nepal’s capital, Kathmandu, crowned by a golden spire that pierces the sky. Painted on each of the spire’s four sides are the benevolent eyes of the Buddha — wide, calm, and unblinking — said to see all that unfolds below. Those eyes have served as a symbol of sanctuary for generations of Tibetans fleeing the Chinese crackdown in their homeland. But today, Tibetan refugees are also watched by far more malevolent eyes: Thousands of CCTV cameras from China, perched on street corners and rooftops to monitor every movement below. This intense surveillance has stifled the once-vibrant Free Tibet movement that had resonated around the world. Nepal is just one of at least 150 countries to which Chinese companies are supplying surveillance technology, from cameras in Vietnam to censorship firewalls in Pakistan to citywide monitoring systems in Kenya. This technology is now a key part of China’s push for global influence, as it provides cash-strapped governments cost-effective, if invasive, forms of policing — turning algorithms and data into a force multiplier for control. The irony at the heart of this digital authoritarianism is that the surveillance tools China exports are based on technology developed in its greatest rival, the United States, despite warnings that Chinese firms would buy, copy or outright steal American designs, an investigation by The Associated Press has found.

For decades, Silicon Valley firms often yielded to Beijing’s demands: Give us your technology and we will give you access to our market. Although tensions fester between Washington and Beijing, the links between American tech and Chinese surveillance continue today. For example, Amazon Web Services offers cloud services to Chinese tech giants like Hikvision and Dahua, assisting them in their overseas push. Both are on the U.S. Commerce Department’s Entity List for national security and human-rights concerns, which means transactions with them are not illegal but subject to strict restrictions. AWS told AP it adheres to ethical codes of conduct, complies with U.S. law, and does not itself offer surveillance infrastructure. Dahua said they conduct due diligence to prevent abuse of their products. Hikvision said the same, and that they “categorically reject any suggestion that the company is involved in or complicit in repression.” Chinese technology firms now offer a complete suite of telecommunications, surveillance, and digital infrastructure, with few restrictions on who they sell to or how they’re used. China pitches itself as a global security model with low crime rates, contrasting its record with the United States, said Sheena Greitens, a political scientist at the University of Texas at Austin. “It’s got a set of solutions that it’s happy to share with the world that nobody else can offer,” she said. “(But) they’re certainly exporting the tools and techniques that are very important to authoritarian rule.”

The AP investigation was based on thousands of Nepali government procurement documents, corporate marketing material, leaked government and corporate documents, and interviews with more than 40 people, including Tibetan refugees and Nepali, American and Chinese engineers, executives, experts and officials. While thousands of Tibetans once fled to Nepal every year, the number is now down to the single digits, according to Tibetan officials in Nepal. In a statement to AP, the Tibetan government in exile cited tight border controls, Nepal’s warming ties with China and “unprecedented surveillance” as reasons for the drastic plunge. A 2021 internal Nepali government report, obtained by AP, revealed that China has even built surveillance systems within Nepal and in some areas of the border buffer zone where construction is banned by bilateral agreements. In a statement to AP, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs denied coercing Western companies to hand over technology or working with Nepal to surveil Tibetans, calling it a “sheer fabrication driven by ulterior motives.” “Attempts to use Tibet-related issues to interfere in China’s internal affairs, smear China’s image, and poison the atmosphere of China-Nepal cooperation will never succeed,” the statement said. The Nepali government and the Chinese-controlled Tibetan authorities did not respond to requests for comment.

Under pressure, many Tibetans are responding the only way they can: Leaving. The Tibetan population in Nepal has plunged from over 20,000 to half that or less today. Former activist Sonam Tashi gave up protesting years ago. Now 49, today he’s just a father trying to get his 10-year-old son out — before the net pulls tighter. The boy was born in Nepal but has no document proving he is either a refugee or a citizen, a result of Chinese pressure. Tashi described how those considered likely to protest are picked up in advance around key dates — like March 10, which marks the 1959 Tibetan uprising, or July 6, the Dalai Lama’s birthday. In 2018, Nepal’s police magazine confirmed that it was building predictive policing, which allows officers to watch people’s movements, identify in advance who they think will protest and arrest them preemptively. “There are cameras everywhere,” Tashi said, sitting on a bus winding toward the Indian border. “There is no future.”

‘They gave us all the hardware’

After China crushed a Tibetan uprising in 1959, thousands fled across the Himalayas to Nepal, carrying only what they could: Religious paintings, prayer wheels and the weight of families left behind. Their exodus, led by the charismatic Dalai Lama, captured the American imagination, with Hollywood films and actor Richard Gere’s congressional appeals putting Tibet in the spotlight. Washington trod a careful line, defending the rights and religious freedom of Tibetans without recognizing independence. Today, the future of the Free Tibet movement is in question. Without refugee cards that grant basic rights, Tibetans in Nepal can no longer open bank accounts, work legally or leave the country. Cameras are now everywhere in Kathmandu, perched on traffic lights and swiveling from temple eaves. Most link back to a four-story brick building just a few blocks down from the Chinese embassy, where officers watch the country in real time. The building hums with the low breath of cooling fans. Inside, a wall of monitors blinks with feeds from border towns, busy markets and clogged traffic crossings. Officers in crisp blue uniforms and red caps sit in the glow, scanning scenes. Beneath the screens, a photo published in a Nepali daily shows, a sign in English and Chinese reads: “With the compliments of the Ministry of Public Security of China.”  Their reach is vast. Operators can track a motorbike weaving through the capital, follow a protest as it forms, or patch an alert directly to patrol radios. Many cameras are equipped with night vision facial recognition and AI tracking — able to pick a single face out of a festival crowd or lock onto a figure until it disappears indoors. The system not only sees but is learning to remember, storing patterns of movement, building a record of lives lived under its gaze. A 34-year-old Tibetan cafe owner in the city watched the city change in quiet horror. “Now you can only be Tibetan in private,” he said. He and other Tibetans in Nepal spoke to AP anonymously, fearing retaliation. 

The first cameras in Boudhanath were installed in 2012, officially to deter crime. But after a Tibetan monk doused himself in petrol and set himself ablaze in front of the stupa in 2013, police added 35 night vision cameras around it. The Chinese embassy in Kathmandu worked closely with the police, said Rupak Shrestha, a professor at Simon Fraser University in Canada who studied surveillance in Nepal. He said the police received special training to use the new cameras, identify potential symbols associated with the Free Tibet movement and anticipate dissent. In 2013, a team of Nepal Police officers crossed the northern border into Tibet for a seemingly straightforward mission: Collect police radios from Chinese authorities in Zhangmu, a remote border town, about 120 kilometers (75 miles) from Kathmandu. A truck was loaded with equipment and a few handshakes later, they were driving back to Kathmandu. The radios — made by the partly state-owned Chinese firm Hytera — looked like walkie-talkies but ran on a digital trunking system, a scaled-down mobile network for police use. Officers could talk privately, coordinate across districts, even patch into public phone lines. The entire system — radios, relay towers, software — was a $5.5 million gift from China. “They didn’t give us the money,” recalled a retired Nepali officer who made the trip. “They gave all the hardware. All Chinese.” He remembered not the border guards but the tech — sleek, reliable, and far ahead of anything they’d used before. He spoke on condition of anonymity to describe sensitive internal discussions. He said Nepal had initially considered buying the technology from the U.S. and only wanted to deploy the system in its two biggest cities. Hytera was a fraction of the cost and performed comparably, but China also wanted coverage near the border with Tibet. Nepal acquiesced. They installed the technology in Sindhupalchowk, a border district with a key road to China used by Tibetan refugees. “We understood their mindset,” the retired officer said. “A secure border.” A police envoy from the Chinese embassy began making regular visits to the Nepal Police headquarters. He’d chat over coffee, flip through brochures from Chinese companies. “He’d say, ‘You want anything?’” the retired officer recalled. China began donating tens of millions in police aid and surveillance equipment, including a new school for Nepal’s Armed Police Force. Hundreds of Nepali police traveled to China for training on policing and border control, according to Chinese government posts.

Ahead of a summit of South Asian leaders in 2014, among the goods on offer were ones from Uniview, China’s pitch for an all-seeing eye.  The company was the Chinese surveillance business of what was then Hewlett Packard, or HP, before it was spun off in a 2011 deal. Since 2012, Uniview has been selling mass surveillance solutions to the Tibetan police, such as a command center, and developed cameras that track ethnicities such as Uyghurs and Tibetans. Uniview installed cameras in Kathmandu for Nepal’s first “safe city” project in 2016. It started with the city’s roads, then went up across the capital — in tourist areas, religious sites, high-security zones like Parliament and the prime minister’s home. The cameras didn’t just record. Some could follow people automatically as they moved. Others were designed to use less data, making it easier to store and review footage. Hewlett Packard Enterprise, or HPE, a successor company to HP that sells security solutions, has no ownership in Uniview and declined to comment. Hytera and Uniview did not respond to requests for comment.

Nearly all the cameras installed in Nepal are now made by Chinese companies like Hikvision, Dahua and Uniview, and many come bundled with facial recognition and AI tracking software. Hikvision’s website and marketing materials advertise camera systems in Nepal linked via Hik-Connect and HikCentral Connect, cloud products that rely on Amazon Web Services. Hikvision sells to the Nepali police and government, and a template for Nepali tenders indicates CCTV cameras procured for the government are required to support Hik-Connect. In return for Beijing’s support, top Nepali officials have thanked China repeatedly over the years, promising never to allow “anti-China activities” on Nepali territory. The Nepali police head offices aren’t far from the now-forlorn Tibetan reception center, which used to shelter tired, hungry Tibetans fleeing across the border. The building is nearly empty. The gates are locked. Those who do escape, like Namkyi, arrested at 15 for protesting Chinese rule, often have to wait for weeks confined indoors until they’re smuggled out again to the Tibetan capital in exile in India. Silence has become survival. “They know they are being watched,” she said. “Even though we are free, the surveillance cameras mean we’re actually living in a big prison.” 

From clients to competitors

From the start, U.S. companies eager for China’s vast markets exchanged technology for entry. Many were required to start joint ventures and research operations in China as a precondition for being allowed in. Dozens, if not hundreds, complied, transferring valuable know-how and expertise — even in sensitive areas like encryption or policing. Little by little, Chinese companies chipped away at the lead of American tech companies by luring talent, obtaining research, and sometimes plain copying their hardware and software. The flow of technology continued, even as U.S. officials openly accused China of economic espionage and pressuring American companies for their technology. “China is by far the most egregious actor when it comes to forced technology transfer,” Robert D. Atkinson, then-president of a think tank focused on innovation, warned Congress in a 2012 hearing. American tech resistance came to a final, definitive end later that year with Edward Snowden’s revelations that U.S. intelligence was exploiting American technology to spy on Beijing. Spooked, the Chinese government told Western firms they risked being kicked out unless they handed over their technology and provided security guarantees. After companies like HP and IBM agreed, their former partners became their fiercest global competitors — and unlike American firms, they faced few questions about the way their technology was being used. Companies like Huawei, Hikvision and Dahua have now become global behemoths that sell surveillance systems and gear all over the world.

American technology was key to this:

– Uniview, the Chinese AI-powered CCTV camera supplier, supplied the first phase of Nepal’s safe city project in 2016, installing cameras in Kathmandu. Uniview was carved out of California-based HP’s China surveillance video business.

– Hytera provided data infrastructure for the Nepali police, such as walkie-talkies and digital trunking technology, which enables real-time communication. Earlier this year, Hytera acknowledged stealing technology from U.S. company Motorola in a plea agreement, and had acquired German, British, Spanish, and American tech businesses in their growth phase.

– Hikvision and Dahua, China’s two largest surveillance camera suppliers, sell many of the cameras now in Nepal. They partnered with Intel and Nvidia to add AI capabilities to surveillance cameras. Those ties ended after U.S. sanctions in 2019, but AWS continues to sell cloud services to both companies, which remains legal under what some lawmakers call a loophole. AWS has advertised to Chinese companies expanding overseas, including at a policing expo in 2023.

– Chinese tech giant Huawei has become one of the world’s leading sellers of surveillance systems, wiring more than 200 cities with sensors. In Nepal, they supplied telecom gear and high-capacity servers at an international airport. Over the years, the company benefited from partnerships with American companies like IBM, and has been dogged by allegations of theft — including copying code from Cisco routers wholesale, a case which Huawei settled out of court in 2004.

Huawei said it provides “general-purpose” products “based on recognized industry standards.” Intel has said it adheres to all laws and regulations where it operates, and cannot control end use of its products. Nvidia has said it does not make surveillance systems or work with police in China at present. IBM and Cisco declined comment. Policing gear maker Motorola Solutions, a successor company to Motorola after it split, did not respond to requests for comment. U.S. technology transfer to Chinese firms has mostly stopped after growing controversy and a slew of sanctions in the past decade. But industry insiders say it’s too late: China, once a tech backwater, is now among the biggest exporters of surveillance technologies on earth. Few realized “the U.S. shouldn’t be selling the software to China because they might copy it, they might use it for these types of surveillance and bad stuff,” said Charles Mok, a Hong Kong IT entrepreneur and former lawmaker now living in exile as a research scholar at Stanford. “Nobody was quick enough to realize this could happen.”

‘The great big eye in the sky’

Inside a 15th-century monastery in Lo Manthang in Nepal’s Mustang district, light slants through wooden slats, catching motes of dust and the faded faces of bodhisattvas. Crumpled notes of Chinese currency lie at the feet of deities in the walled city along the Tibetan border. Here, shops stock Chinese instant noodles and cars with Chinese plates rumble down mountain roads. A gleaming white observation dome just inside Chinese territory looms over the city. Visible from 15 kilometers (9 miles) away, it’s trained on the district that has long been a refuge for Tibetans, including a guerrilla base in the 1960s. The dome is just one node in China’s vast 1,389-kilometer (863-mile) border network with Nepal — a “Great Wall of Steel” of fences, sensors and AI-powered drones.  Chinese forces have barred ethnic Tibetans from accessing traditional pastures and performing sacred rites. They have pressured residents of Lo Manthang to remove photos of the Dalai Lama from shops. And a “China-Nepal joint command mechanism” meets several times a month on border patrols and repatriations, according to a post by the Chinese-run Tibetan government. The result is that the once-porous frontier is now effectively sealed, and China’s digital dragnet reaches deep into the lives of those who live near it.

In April 2024, Rapke Lama was chatting with a friend across the border on WeChat when he received an invitation to meet. He set out from his village and crossed into Tibet — only to be arrested almost immediately. Lama believes his WeChat exchange was monitored; Chinese police appeared with unsettling precision, as if they knew where to look. After accusing him — wrongly, he maintains — of helping Tibetans flee into Nepal, the police seized his phone, which had photos of the Dalai Lama and Tibetan music. Then came months in a Lhasa prison, where isolation and inadequate medical care hollowed him out. Lama did not return to Nepal until May 2025, gaunt and shaken. He later said he entered Tibet to harvest caterpillar fungus, valued in traditional Chinese medicine. Another friend who crossed the border remains in custody. “Even now, I’m scared,” Lama says. He wears masks when wandering the streets, he says, “because of that lingering fear.” The Chinese observation dome is a giant symbol of the same fear, towering over the border. “It’s the great big eye in the sky,” said a 73-year-old Tibetan hotel owner in Nepal, who spotted the installation during a trip near the border last year. “For Tibetan refugees, Nepal has become a second China.”

As Canada tries to reduce its dependence on the US, its leader will visit China to rebuild ties

A leader of Canada is visiting China this week for the first time in nearly a decade, a bid to rebuild the country’s fractured relations with the world’s second-largest economy — and reduce Canada’s dependence on the United States. The push by Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, who arrives Wednesday, is part of a major rethink as ties sour with the U.S. — the world’s No. 1 economy and long the largest trading partner for Canada by far. Carney aims to double Canada’s non-American exports in the next decade in the face of U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs and the American leader’s musing that Canada could become “the 51st state.” “At a time of global trade disruption, Canada is focused on building a more competitive, sustainable and independent economy,” Carney said in a statement. “We’re forging new partnerships around the world to transform our economy from one that has been reliant on a single trade partner.” Carney will meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Friday and other officials. Canadian officials, in a briefing with reporters, said that it’s an attempt re-energize a dormant strategic partnership and also noted that Washington’s intervention in Venezuela is far reaching. Canadian officials said that there will be progress on trade irritants with Beijing, but not a definitive elimination of some tariffs. Two of Carney’s lawmakers, meanwhile, said they are quitting a sponsored trip to Taiwan early to “avoid confusion” about Canada’s China policy as Carney prepares to visit Beijing.

In a joint statement, Liberal lawmakers Helena Jaczek and Marie-France Lalonde said while they are returning to Canada based on “advice from the government,” it does not change Canada’s stance on Taiwan. China views self-governed Taiwan as its sovereign territory and has said it would take it by force if needed. Michael Chong, the opposition Conservative foreign affairs critic, said the Liberal decision to quit the trip early is “nothing short of kowtowing to Beijing’s authoritarianism.” Carney will be in China until Saturday, and then visit Qatar before attending the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, next week. Trump’s tariffs have pushed both Canada and China to look for opportunities to strengthen international cooperation, said Zhu Feng, the dean of the School of International Studies at China’s Nanjing University. “Carney’s visit does reflect the new space for further development in China-Canadian relations under the current U.S. trade protectionism,” he said. But he cautioned against overestimating the importance of the visit, noting that Canada remains a U.S. ally. The two North American nations also share a deep cultural heritage and a common geography.

Pivoting toward China

Carney has been in office less than a year, succeeding Justin Trudeau, who was prime minister for nearly a decade. He’s not the first new leader of a country to try to repair relations with China. Australian Premier Anthony Albanese has reset ties since his Labor Party came to power in 2022. Relations had deteriorated under the previous conservative government, leading to Chinese trade restrictions on wine, beef, coal and other Australian exports. U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer has sought to repair ties with China since his Labour Party ousted the Conservatives in 2024. He is reportedly planning a visit to China, though the government has not confirmed that. The two governments have differences, with Starmer raising the case of former Hong Kong media magnate Jimmy Lai, a British citizen whose conviction under a national security law has raised concerns about press freedom, in talks with Xi in late 2024 in Brazil. Trump, who has said he will come to China in April, has indicated that he wants a smooth relationship with Beijing, though he also launched a tit-for-tat trade war, with tariffs rising to more than 100% before he backed down.

Bumpy relations

In Canada, Trump’s threats have raised questions about the country’s longstanding relationship with its much more powerful neighbor. Those close ties have also been the source of much of Canada’s friction with China in recent years. It was Canada’s detention of a Chinese telecommunications executive at the request of the U.S. that started the deterioration of relations in late 2018. The U.S. wanted the Huawei Technologies Co. executive, Meng Wanzhou, to be extradited to face American charges. China retaliated by arresting two Canadians, Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor, on spying charges. While they were imprisoned, Meng was under house arrest in Vancouver, a Canadian city home to a sizable Chinese population. All three were released under a deal reached in 2021. More recently, Canada followed the U.S. in imposing a 100% tariff on electric vehicles and a 25% tariff on steel and aluminum from China.

China, which is Canada’s No. 2 trading partner after the U.S., has hit back with tariffs on Canadian exports including canola, seafood and pork. It has indicated it would remove some of the tariffs if Canada were to drop the 100% charge on EVs. An editorial in China’s state-run Global Times newspaper welcomed Carney’s visit as a new starting point and called on Canada to lift “unreasonable tariff restrictions” and advance more pragmatic cooperation. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said Monday that China looks forward to Carney’s visit as an opportunity to “consolidate the momentum of improvement in China-Canada relations.”

Canada-India ties

Carney met with Xi in late October in South Korea, where both were attending the annual Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit. He has also tried to mend ties with India, where relations deteriorated in 2024 after the Trudeau government accused India of being involved in the 2023 killing of a Sikh activist in Canada. The fallout led to tit-for-tat expulsions of senior diplomats, disruption of visa services, reduced consular staffing and a freeze on trade talks. A cautious thaw began last June. Since then, both sides have restored some consular services and resumed diplomatic contacts. In November, Canadian Foreign Minister Anita Anand said that the two countries would move quickly to advance a trade deal, noting the government’s new foreign policy in response to Trump’s trade war. Carney is also expected to visit India later this year.

China is using a “robot antelope” to monitor in real time the migration of the Tibetan antelope.

Aug 12, 2025, 04:11 PM

BEIJING – To the wolves of Tibet, China’s first “robot antelope” may look as appetising as the real herds that roam the rugged tundra. But the “creature” is part of Beijing’s growing surveillance that now even reaches into its most remote places. Its doe-like eyes and thick brown fur make the robotic ruminant nearly indistinguishable from the real antelope as the 5G- and AI-integrated imposter scans the Hoh Xil plateau with its sensors, footage from China’s state news agency Xinhua shows.

Developed by Xinhua, the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Hangzhou-based Deep Robotics, the robot antelope is equipped with 5G connectivity and artificial intelligence vision systems, enabling real-time monitoring of the migration, feeding and mating behaviours of the endangered species endemic to Tibet.

5G arrived in Tibet in 2019, according to Chinese government documents, and the south-western region reached 1 million users by 2022. With the completion of a 5G base station in the town of Gogmo in late 2023, every district in Tibet was covered, state media reported.

Beyond transmitting live images and tracking data on rare antelope species, Tibet’s 5G infrastructure now supports a growing range of AI applications, from small drones that can operate in areas impenetrable to radar, to telemedicine consultations and smart yak herding technologies, according to Chinese state media reports. China has invested heavily in Tibet, boosting the at times restive region’s role in President Xi Jinping’s flagship Belt and Road by strengthening its trade ties with Central Asia, while also tightening surveillance over its population and extending Beijing’s digital footprint towards neighbouring rival India. Analysts and human rights campaigners accuse Beijing of deploying “grey-zone” tactics against countries around the Tibetan plateau.

A July report from the Centre of Strategic and International Studies think tank documented instances of China leveraging local telecommunications networks to surveil dissidents living in neighbouring Nepal, alongside cases of cyber theft. REUTERS

Reuters

Tue, August 12, 2025 

EXCLUSIVE: Thai gallery removes China-focused artworks after ‘pressure’ from Beijing

EXCLUSIVE: Thai gallery removes China-focused artworks after ‘pressure’ from Beijing

China accused the organisers of an exhibition in Thailand of promoting fallacies about its policies on Tibet, Xinjiang and Hong Kong after the show’s co-curator said artworks were removed or altered at Beijing’s request. As China builds influence in Southeast Asia, regional governments are treading cautiously as they balance cooperation with the world’s second biggest economy against concerns about political sovereignty.

Replying to Reuters’ queries about the exhibition, which opened in the Thai capital on July 24, the foreign ministry said on Monday it distorted Chinese policies and “undermined China’s core interests and political dignity”. It neither confirmed nor denied that the Chinese embassy was behind the removal and alteration.

“The fact that the relevant country took timely measures precisely shows that the promotion of the fallacies of ‘Tibetan independence’, ‘East Turkestan Islamic Movement’ and ‘Hong Kong independence’ has no market internationally and is unpopular,” it added.

The gallery and Thailand’s foreign ministry did not respond to requests for comment. Bangkok Arts and Cultural Centre, one of Thailand’s top galleries, removed or altered artworks on Hong Kong as well as the Chinese government’s treatment of ethnic minorities in Tibet and Xinjiang at the request of the Chinese embassy.

The show, titled “Constellation of Complicity: Visualising the Global Machinery of Authoritarian Solidarity”, had a theme of authoritarian governments and featured works by artists in exile. Its co-curator, Sai, an artist from Myanmar who goes by one name, said China’s response showed it was “engaging in systematic political manipulation far beyond its borders”, such as in his own country, where Beijing backs the ruling military.

If the claims about ethnic minority causes were true, he said, there would have been no need to send officials “into galleries in Thailand, no need to black out artists’ names, and no need to threaten institutions into compliance.”

He added, “Censorship is never the weapon of those confident in the strength of their ideas.”

(Reporting by Ryan Woo; Writing by Yukun Zhang; Additional reporting by Poppy Mcpherson; Editing by Ed Osmond and Clarence Fernandez)

Dharamshala: On the occasion of my 90th birthday, I understand that well-wishers and friends in many places, including Tibetan communities, are gathering for celebrations. I particularly appreciate the fact that many of you are using the occasion to engage in initiatives that highlight the importance of compassion, warm-heartedness, and altruism.

I am just a simple Buddhist monk; I don’t normally engage in birthday celebrations. However, since you are organizing events focused on my birthday I wish to share some thoughts.

While it is important to work for material development, it is vital to focus on achieving peace of mind through cultivating a good heart and by being compassionate, not just toward near and dear ones, but toward everyone. Through this, you will contribute to making the world a better place.

As for myself, I will continue to focus on my commitments of promoting human values, religious harmony, drawing attention to the ancient Indian wisdom which explains the workings of mind and emotions, and Tibetan culture and heritage, which has so much potential to contribute to the world through its emphasis on peace of mind and compassion.

I develop determination and courage in my daily life through the teachings of the Buddha and Indian masters such as Shantideva, whose following aspiration I strive to uphold.

As long as space endures,
As long as sentient being remain,
Until then, may I too remain
To dispel the miseries of the world.

Thank you for using the opportunity of my birthday to cultivate peace of mind and compassion.

Tashi Deleg and with prayers,

Dalai Lama

5 July 2025

Laura Bicker China correspondent Reporting from Aba, Sichuan province

The BBC visited the Kirti monastery in Aba, which has long been the heart of Tibetan resistance to Beijing. Shrouded in crimson robes, prayer beads moving rhythmically past his fingers, the monk walks towards us. It is a risky decision.

We are being followed by eight unidentified men. Even saying a few words to us in public could get him in trouble. But he appears willing to take the chance. “Things here are not good for us,” he says quietly.

This monastery in China’s south-western Sichuan province has been at the centre of Tibetan resistance for decades – the world learned the name in the late 2000s as Tibetans set themselves on fire there in defiance of Chinese rule. Nearly two decades later, there are signs the Kirti monastery still worries Beijing.

A police station has been built inside the main entrance. It sits alongside a small dark room full of prayer wheels which squeak as they spin. Nests of surveillance cameras on thick steel poles surround the compound, scanning every corner. “They do not have a good heart; everyone can see it,” the monk adds. Then comes a warning. “Be careful, people are watching you.” As the men tailing us come running, the monk walks away.

Prayer wheels depict rich murals from the Buddha’s life inside the monastery

“They” are the Communist Party of China, which has now governed more than six million Tibetans for almost 75 years, ever since it annexed the region in 1950. China has invested heavily in the region, building new roads and railways to boost tourism and integrate it with the rest of the country. Tibetans who have fled say economic development also brought more troops and officials, chipping away at their faith and freedoms.

Beijing views Tibet as an integral part of China. It has labelled Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, as a separatist, and those who display his image or offer him public support could end up behind bars. Still, some in Aba, or Ngaba in Tibetan, which is home to the Kirti monastery, have gone to extreme measures to challenge these restrictions.

The town sits outside what China calls the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), created in 1965, comprising about half of the Tibetan plateau. But millions of Tibetans live outside of TAR – and consider the rest as part of their homeland. Aba has long played a crucial role. Protests erupted here during the Tibet-wide uprising of 2008 after, by some accounts, a monk held up a photo of the Dalai Lama inside the Kirti monastery. It eventually escalated into a riot and Chinese troops opened fire. At least 18 Tibetans were killed in this tiny town.

As Tibet rose up in protest, it often turned into violent clashes with Chinese paramilitary. Beijing claims 22 people died, while Tibetan groups in exile put the number at around 200.

In the years that followed there were more than 150 self-immolations calling for the return of the Dalai Lama – most of them happened in or around Aba. It earned the main street a grim moniker: Martyr’s row. China has cracked down harder since, making it nearly impossible to determine what is happening in Tibet or Tibetan areas. The information that does emerge comes from those who have fled abroad, or the government-in-exile in India.

Tibetan monasteries are closely surveilled because of the influence they still wield

To find out a little more, we returned to the monastery the next day before dawn. We snuck past our minders and hiked our way back to Aba for the morning prayers. The monks gathered in their yellow hats, a symbol of the Gelug school of Buddhism. Low sonorous chanting resonated through the hall as ritual smoke lingered in the still, humid air. Around 30 local men and women, most in traditional Tibetan long-sleeved jackets, sat cross-legged until a small bell chimed to end the prayer.

“The Chinese government has poisoned the air in Tibet. It is not a good government,” one monk told us. “We Tibetans are denied basic human rights. The Chinese government continues to oppress and persecute us. It is not a government that serves the people.” He gave no details, and our conversations were brief to avoid detection. Still, it is rare to hear these voices.

The question of Tibet’s future has taken on urgency with the Dalai Lama turning 90 this week. Hundreds of followers have been gathering in the Indian town of Dharamshala to honour him. He announced the much-anticipated succession plan on Wednesday, reaffirming what he has said before: the next Dalai Lama would be chosen after his death. Tibetans everywhere have reacted – with relief, doubt or anxiety – but not those in the Dalai Lama’s homeland, where even the whisper of his name is forbidden.

Beijing has spoken loud and clear: the next reincarnation of the Dalai Lama will be in China, and approved by the Chinese Communist Party. Tibet, however, has been silent. “That’s just the way it is,” the monk told us. “That’s the reality.”

The road to Aba winds slowly for nearly 500km (300 miles) from the Sichuan capital of Chengdu. It passes through the snow-packed peaks of Siguniang Mountain before it reaches the rolling grassland at the edge of the Himalayan plateau.

The gold, sloping rooftops of Buddhist temples shimmer every few miles as they catch especially sharp sunlight. This is the roof of the world where traffic gives way to yak herders on horseback whistling to reluctant, grunting cattle, as eagles circle above.

There are two worlds underneath this Himalayan sky, where heritage and faith have collided with the Party’s demand for unity and control.

China has long maintained that Tibetans are free to practise their faith. But that faith is also the source of a centuries-old identity, which human rights groups say Beijing is slowly eroding. They claim that countless Tibetans have been detained for staging peaceful protests, promoting the Tibetan language, or even possessing a portrait of the Dalai Lama.

Many Tibetans, inlcuding some we spoke to within the Kirti monastery, are concerned about new laws governing the education of Tibetan children. All under-18s must now attend Chinese state-run schools and learn Mandarin. They cannot study Buddhist scriptures in a monastery class until they are 18 years old – and they must “love the country and the religion and follow national laws and regulations”. This is a huge change for a community where monks were often recruited as children, and monasteries doubled up as schools for most boys.

The Chinese national flag above the Kirti monastery: the Party’s ambitions have clashed with the Tibetan faith, which underpins their identity

“One of the nearby Buddhist institutions was torn down by the government a few months ago,” a monk in his 60s told us in Aba, from under an umbrella as he walked to prayers in the rain. “It was a preaching school,” he added, becoming emotional.

The new rules follow a 2021 order for all schools in Tibetan areas, including kindergartens, to teach in the Chinese language. Beijing says this gives Tibetan children a better shot at jobs in a country where the main language is Mandarin. But such regulations could have a “profound effect” on the future of Tibetan Buddhism, according to renowned scholar Robert Barnett. “We are moving to a scenario of the Chinese leader Xi Jinping having total control – towards an era of little information getting into Tibet, little Tibetan language being shared,” Mr Barnett says. “Schooling will almost entirely be about Chinese festivals, Chinese virtues, advanced Chinese traditional culture. We are looking at the complete management of intellectual input.”

The road to Aba shows off the money Beijing has pumped into this remote corner of the world. A new high-speed railway line hugs the hills linking Sichuan to other provinces on the plateau. In Aba, the usual high-street shop fronts selling monks’ robes and bundles of incense are joined by new hotels, cafes and restaurants to entice tourists.

Aba’s ancient monasteries are now drawing more Chinese tourists

“How do they get anything done all day?” one tourist wonders aloud. Others turn the prayer wheels excitedly and ask about the rich, colourful murals depicting scenes from the Buddha’s life. A party slogan written on the roadside boasts that “people of all ethnic groups are united as closely as seeds in a pomegranate”. But it’s hard to miss the pervasive surveillance. A hotel check-in requires facial recognition. Even buying petrol requires several forms of identification which are shown to high-definition cameras. China has long controlled what information its citizens have access to – but in Tibetan areas, the grip is even tighter. Tibetans, Mr Barnett says, are “locked off from the outside world”.

It’s hard to say how many of them know about the Dalai Lama’s announcement on Wednesday – broadcast to the world, it was censored in China. Living in exile in India since 1959, the 14th Dalai Lama has advocated for more autonomy, rather than full independence, for his homeland. Beijing believes he “has no right to represent the Tibetan people”.

He handed over political authority in 2011 to a government-in-exile chosen democratically by 130,000 Tibetans globally – and that government has had back-channel talks this year with China about the succession plan, but it’s unclear if they have progressed.

The Dalai Lama has previously suggested that his successor would be from “the free world”, that is, outside China. On Wednesday, he said “no one else has any authority to interfere”. This sets the stage for a confrontation with Beijing, which has said the process should “follow religious rituals and historical customs, and be handled in accordance with national laws and regulations”.

Tibetans in China have very restricted access to information – especially if it has to do with the Dalai Lama. Beijing is already doing the groundwork to convince the Tibetans, Mr Barnett says.

“There is already a huge propaganda apparatus in place. The Party has been sending teams to offices, schools and villages to teach people about the ‘new regulations’ for choosing a Dalai Lama.” When the Panchen Lama, the second highest authority in Tibetan Buddhism, died in 1989, the Dalai Lama identified a successor to that post in Tibet. But the child disappeared. Beijing was accused of kidnapping him, although it insists that boy, now an adult, is safe. It then approved a different Panchen Lama, who Tibetans outside China do not recognise.

If there are two Dalai Lamas, it could become a test of China’s powers of persuasion. Which one will the world recognise? More important, would most Tibetans in China even know of the other Dalai Lama? China wants a credible successor – but perhaps no one too credible. Because, Mr Barnett says, Beijing “wants to turn the lion of Tibetan culture into a poodle”. “It wants to remove things it perceives as risky and replace them with things it believes Tibetans ought to be thinking about; patriotism, loyalty, fealty. They like the singing and dancing – the Disney version of Tibetan culture.”

“We don’t know how much will survive,” Mr Barnett concludes.

Many Tibetans believe their way of life is being eroded by Chinese control…despite all their efforts to hold on to it

As we leave the monastery, a line of women carrying heavy baskets filled with tools for construction or farming walk through the room of prayer wheels, spinning them clockwise.

They sing in Tibetan and smile as they pass, their greying, pleated hair only just visible under their sun hats. Tibetans have clung on to their identity for 75 years now, fighting for it and dying for it.

The challenge now will be to protect it, even when the man who embodies their beliefs – and their resistance – is gone.

Wed July 2, 2025

Dharamshala, India/Hong Kong CNN  —

The Dalai Lama has announced that he will have a successor after his death, continuing a centuries-old tradition that has become a flashpoint in the struggle with China’s Communist Party over Tibet’s future.

Tibetan Buddhism’s spiritual leader made the declaration on Wednesday in a video message to religious elders gathering in Dharamshala, India, where the Nobel Peace laureate has lived since fleeing Tibet after a failed uprising against Chinese communist rule in 1959.

“I am affirming that the institution of the Dalai Lama will continue,” the Dalai Lama said in the pre-recorded video, citing requests he received over the years from Tibetans and Tibetan Buddhists urging him to do so.

“The Gaden Phodrang Trust has sole authority to recognize the future reincarnation; no one else has any such authority to interfere in this matter,” he added, using the formal name for the office of the Dalai Lama.

The office should carry out the procedures of search and recognition of the future dalai lama “in accordance with past tradition,” he said, without revealing further details on the process.

The Dalai Lama has previously stated that when he is about 90 years old, he will consult the high lamas of Tibetan Buddhism and the Tibetan public to re-evaluate whether the institution of the dalai lama should continue.

Wednesday’s announcement – delivered days before his 90th birthday this Sunday – sets the stage for a high-stakes battle over his succession, between Tibetan leaders in exile and China’s atheist Communist Party, which insists it alone holds the authority to approve the next dalai lama.

In a memoir published in March, the Dalai Lama states that his successor will be born in the “free world” outside China, urging his followers to reject any candidate selected by Beijing.

That could lead to the emergence of two rival dalai lamas: one chosen by his predecessor, the other by the Chinese Communist Party, experts say.

“Both the Tibetan exile community and the Chinese government want to influence the future of Tibet, and they see the next Dalai Lama as the key to do so,” said Ruth Gamble, an expert in Tibetan history at La Trobe University in Melbourne, Australia.

Samdhong Rinpoche, a senior official at the Dalai Lama’s office, told reporters on Wednesday that any further information about the procedures or methods of the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation would not be revealed to the public until the succession takes place. 

 Struggle over succession

Over a lifetime in exile, the 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso, has become synonymous with Tibet and its quest for genuine autonomy under Beijing’s tightening grip on the Himalayan region.

From his adopted hometown of Dharamshala, where he established a government-in-exile, the spiritual leader has unified Tibetans at home and in exile and elevated their plight onto the global stage.

That has made the Dalai Lama a persistent thorn in the side of Beijing, which denounces him as a dangerous “separatist” and a “wolf in monk’s robes.”

Since the 1970s, the Dalai Lama has maintained that he no longer seeks full independence for Tibet, but “meaningful” autonomy that would allow Tibetans to preserve their distinct culture, religion and identity. His commitment to the nonviolent “middle way” approach has earned him international support and the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989.

The Dalai Lama has long been wary of Beijing’s attempt to meddle with the reincarnation system of Tibetan Buddhism.

Tibetan Buddhists believe in the circle of rebirth, and that when an enlightened spiritual master like the Dalai Lama dies, he will be able to choose the place and time of his rebirth through the force of compassion and prayer.

But the religious tradition has increasingly become a battleground for the control of Tibetan hearts and minds, especially since the contested reincarnation of the Panchen Lama, the second-highest figure in the religion.

In 1995, years after the death of the 10th Panchen Lama, Beijing installed its own panchen lama in defiance of the Dalai Lama, whose pick for the role – a six-year-old boy – has since vanished from public view.

Under Tibetan tradition, the dalai lamas and the panchen lamas have long played key roles in recognizing each other’s reincarnations. Experts believe Beijing will seek to interfere in the current Dalai Lama’s succession in a similar way.

“There’s a whole series of high-level reincarnated lamas cultivated by the Chinese government to work with it inside Tibet. (Beijing) will call on all of those to help establish the Dalai Lama that they pick inside Tibet,” Gamble said. “There’s been a long-term plan to work toward this.”

Beijing has repeatedly said that the reincarnation of all Living Buddhas – or high-ranking lamas in Tibetan Buddhism – must comply with Chinese laws and regulations, with search and identification conducted in China and approved by the central government.

A “resolution of gratitude” statement released by Tibetan Buddhist religious leaders gathering in Dharamshala on Wednesday said they “strongly condemn the People’s Republic of China’s usage of reincarnation subject for their political gain” and “will never accept it.”

For his part, the current Dalai Lama has made clear that any candidate appointed by Beijing will hold no legitimacy in the eyes of Tibetans or followers of Tibetan Buddhism.

“It is totally inappropriate for Chinese Communists, who explicitly reject religion, including the idea of past and future lives, to meddle in the system of reincarnation of lamas, let alone that of the Dalai Lama,” he writes in his latest memoir, “Voice for the Voiceless.”

The Kailash Manasarovar pilgrimage has long served as a bellwether for the level of tensions between the world’s two most populous countries.

June 21, 2025 at 8:51 a.m

Mount Kailash, seen in 2017, is a site Hindus believe to be the dwelling of the deity Lord Shiva. (Christoph Mohr/Picture-alliance/DPA/AP)

By Joshua Yang

A religious pilgrimage from India into China facilitated by both governments has resumed for the first time in five years — the latest sign of a cautious thaw in the contentious relationship between the world’s two most populous nations.

The first batch of Indian pilgrims taking part in the Kailash Manasarovar Yatra — named for the two Tibetan sacred sites the route traverses — left New Delhi on Sunday morning and crossed the mountainous border into China’s Tibet Autonomous Region on Friday. The group of roughly 40 pilgrims acclimatized to the high Himalayan altitudes in the northern Indian state of Sikkim before setting off for a cross-border mountain pass 14,000 feet above sea level. The pilgrimage is set to conclude June 27 at Tibet’s Manasarovar Lake, in the shadow of Mount Kailash, a site Hindus believe to be the dwelling of the deity Lord Shiva. The sites are also sacred to adherents of other religions, including Buddhism and Jainism.

Upender Rao, 64, a lawyer from Hyderabad in southern India, considers himself “most fortunate” to be one of 750 pilgrims chosen by lottery to take part in the trip, which India’s Foreign Ministry planned meticulously. “I am a devotee of Lord Shiva,” so “I want to see the world of Lord Shiva,” he said in a phone interview. “That’s my dream.” It is a dream that Rao has had to put on hold for the past five years. The 2020 pilgrimage was canceled because of the coronavirus pandemic, and subsequent pilgrimages were halted after June 2020, when Chinese and Indian soldiers clashed over disputed territory high in the Himalayas. At least four Chinese and 20 Indian soldiers died in the conflicts, which both sides fought without modern weapons in an apparent effort to avoid escalation.

The Kailash Manasarovar pilgrimage has long served as a bellwether for the state of relations between India and China, which have clashed sporadically for six decades along a disputed, 2,100-mile-long (3,400-kilometer-long) land border stretching from central Asia to the edges of Southeast Asia.

An Indian soldier stands near the Nathu La border crossing between India and China, which is near the Sikkim state capital of Gangtok, on July 4, 2006. 

The border is not the only politically fraught area the pilgrims traverse: Beijing imposes tight restrictions on religious freedom in Tibet, which China annexed in 1951 over the objections of India. Since 1959, India has hosted the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan Buddhist religious leader, and the Tibetan government in exile. The pilgrimage, which crosses into Tibet, could inflame those sensitivities. According to Rao, the Indian Foreign Ministry’s predeparture briefing warned the pilgrims not to praise or talk about the Dalai Lama.

Cooperation to facilitate the Kailash Manasarovar Yatra dates to the mid-20th century, when the pilgrimage was brought up during talks to settle a boundary line between the two countries.

In the resulting 1954 Sino-Indian agreement, the logistics of the pilgrimage were settled — but the location of the border was not. As tensions mounted over disputed territory, China invaded India in 1962. China’s decisive victory in the subsequent war brought China-India relations, and the pilgrimage, to a halt. Nearly two decades later in 1981, a new generation of Chinese and Indian leaders negotiated to reopen the pilgrimage, talks that served as a precursor to negotiating a full renormalization of ties in 1988. Still, the countries failed to agree on a boundary line, and tense border standoffs — in 1987, 2013, 2014, 2015, and 2017 — remained a mainstay of India-China relations.

After the clashes of 2020, which brought the bilateral relationship to its lowest point in four decades, China sealed the Tibetan border with India, while India banned 59 Chinese-made apps — including TikTok — and vowed to become self-reliant and separate itself from Chinese imports. India also increased its security engagement with the Quad, the informal diplomatic grouping of the United States, India, Japan and Australia, in a move toward countering Chinese power and influence.

At the same time, India and China have both backed away from further aggression. “There’s always a risk of unintended clashes” at the border, said Ashok Kantha, the Indian ambassador to China from 2014 to 2016. “I don’t think either side would like that to happen. Finding a modus vivendi, even though we may have our different interests that are not always convergent, is most desirable.” Since the nadir of June 2020 — and minor clashes in 2021 and 2022 — the India-China relationship has shown signs of a slow recovery. Last October, the two sides announced an agreement to resume regular border patrols and committed “to bring the relationship back to sound and steady development at an early date,” the Chinese Foreign Ministry said in a statement. Visits between top officials, including Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, followed. Beijing and New Delhi both have touted the restoration of the Kailash Manasarovar pilgrimage as one of the chief diplomatic breakthroughs to emerge from the rapprochement. China hopes the pilgrims will not only be “spiritually enriched but also enjoy hospitality of Chinese people,” Yu Jing, the spokeswoman of the Chinese Embassy in Delhi, said in a social media post. “From our side, there was interest” in resuming the pilgrimage, “because this resonates quite strongly at the popular level,” said Kantha, who worked on expanding pilgrimage routes during his tenure as ambassador. “The number of pilgrims is relatively small, but there is sentimental value attached to” the Kailash Manasarovar Yatra.Yet an agreement such as this is “low-hanging fruit,” Kantha cautioned. The major geopolitical questions in the India-China relationship remain unresolved: Although last October’s agreement re-established buffer zones along the border, no progress has been made on demarcating the boundary line between the two countries, and there has yet to be a drawdown from the high number of soldiers deployed to the border region by both sides since 2020. The India-China relationship was further strained during last month’s India-Pakistan clashes, which saw Pakistan using Chinese-made jets to shoot down Indian warplanes. Beijing’s implicit support for its longtime ally during the conflict “was not very helpful,” Kantha said. “The level of deference between China-Pakistan came to the fore and created serious misgivings in India. I don’t think that has helped us rebuild relations.” Normalizing relations “will be easier said than done,” said Chietigj Bajpaee, a senior research fellow at Chatham House who specializes in Asian affairs. “The resumption of the Kailash Manasarovar Yatra is more symbolism than substance given the bad blood in the bilateral relationship.” For all the high-level geopolitics at play, though, Rao was pleasantly surprised to encounter a more personal reality on the ground. The pilgrims spent their first night in China at Kangma, a village some 100 miles (about 161 kilometers) behind the border, and met Tibetans for the first time. “Their hospitality is very good,” Rao said.

The Chinese government-selected 11th Panchen Lama Gyaincain Norbu at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on March 4, 2024. 

A young Tibetan controversially appointed by China’s atheist Communist Party as the second-highest spiritual leader in Tibetan Buddhism has pledged to make the religion more Chinese. Gyaltsen Norbu was installed by Beijing as the 11th Panchen Lama in 1995 in defiance of the religion’s highest authority the Dalai Lama, whose pick for the role — a six-year-old boy — has since vanished from public view. China has yet to reveal any information on the whereabouts of the missing boy. The Beijing-appointed Panchen Lama is dismissed as an imposter by many Tibetans at home and in exile, but he is often quoted in China’s state-run media toeing the Communist Party’s line and praising its policies in Tibet.

In a rare meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in Beijing on Friday, Gyaltsen Norbu vowed to make his own contributions to promoting ethnic unity and systematically advancing “the sinicization of religion,” state news agency Xinhua reported. The remarks refer to a sweeping campaign unleashed by Xi with an aim to purge religious faiths of foreign influence and align them more closely with traditional Chinese culture – and the authoritarian rule of the officially atheist Communist Party.

Gyaltsen Norbu also vowed to keep Xi’s teachings firmly in mind, resolutely support the party’s leadership and firmly safeguard national unity and ethnic solidarity, according to Xinhua.

He was told by Xi to carry forward the “patriotic and religious traditions” of Tibetan Buddhism and contribute to fostering “a strong sense of community for the Chinese nation,” Xinhua reported. The meeting comes on the 30th year of the disappearance of the Dalai Lama appointed Panchen Lama.

Following the 1989 death of the 10th Panchen Lama, the second most important figure in Tibetan Buddhism, the Dalai Lama named Tibetan child Gedhun Choekyi Nyima as his colleague’s reincarnation. But three days after he was chosen, according to the US government, Gedhun and his family were disappeared by the Communist Party, which then appointed an alternative Panchen Lama. Gedhun hasn’t been seen in public since.

Two women place a ceremonial scarf above a portrait showing the last know image of Gedhun Choekyi Nyima, in Mcleodganj near Dharamsala, India, on April 25, 2017. 

In a statement marking that anniversary, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio denounced Chinese authorities for “abducting” him and his family. He called on Beijing to immediately release Gedhun Choekyi Nyima and “stop persecuting Tibetans for their religious beliefs.”

In 2020, the Chinese government publicly acknowledged the fate of Gedhun Choekyi Nyima for the first time, describing him as “a college graduate with a job,” and that neither he nor his family wished to be disturbed in their “current normal lives.”

Meanwhile, Gyaltsen Norbu has occupied an increasingly high-profile role since becoming an adult, joining a top Chinese political body, often appearing at important events in Beijing and meeting large crowds in the Tibetan regions of China.

Related articleLetter from Tibet: A breathtaking journey through the tightly guarded spiritual heartland

The contested appointment of the Panchen Lama is widely seen by experts and the Tibetan exile community as Beijing’s attempt to pave the way for the passing – and reincarnation – of the Dalai Lama, who has lived in exile since fleeing to India following a failed Tibetan uprising against Communist Party rule in 1959.

For decades, the Dalai Lama has been a persistent thorn in Beijing’s side as he commanded the loyalty of many Tibetan people from exile and kept their struggle for greater autonomy alive on the world stage. Chinese officials have condemned the Nobel Peace Prize laureate as a “separatist” and a “wolf in monk’s robes.” The Dalai Lama has said he will release details about his succession around his 90th birthday in July. In his latest book, “Voice for the Voiceless,” the Dalai Lama said his successor will be born in the “free world,” which he described as outside China.

Beijing has insisted it will choose his successor – as well as the reincarnation of all Tibetan Buddhist lamas, but the Dalai Lama and his supporters have said that any successor named by China would not be respected.

Dharamshala: The Scottish Government has reaffirmed its support for religious freedom and human rights for the Tibetan people, particularly on the issue of the reincarnation of His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama.

During the session of the Scottish Parliament on 22 May 2025, a Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP), Ross Greer, raised questions regarding the Scottish government’s plans to commemorate the upcoming 90th birthday of His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama with Buddhist community in Scotland and concerns around Chinese interference in the reincarnation.

In response, the Minister for Equalities, Kaukab Stewart, expressed the Scottish Government’s deep appreciation for the contributions of all faith and belief communities in Scotland, including Buddhists. She extended warm wishes to His Holiness and the Buddhist community, recognising their role in fostering peace, compassion, and cultural diversity throughout the country.

MSP Ross Greer also drew attention to the Chinese government’s abduction of the six-year-old Panchen Lama 30 years ago and the subsequent installation of another boy in in his place. MSP Greer voiced concerns widely shared among Tibetans that similar interference may be attempted in the future regarding the reincarnation of His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama. He questioned whether the Scottish Government would commit to recognising only a future Dalai Lama chosen in accordance with Tibetan Buddhist traditions and teachings, free from foreign interference.

Hon’ble Minister Kaukab Stewart stressed, “The Scottish Government supports the principals of religious freedom and human rights. It believes that the Tibetan Buddhist community should have the right to choose the next Dalai Lama without external interference.”

Department of Information and International Relations

Central Tibetan Administration

Dharamsala, Distt. Kangra (H.P.)

176215 India