41 Tibetan refugees still at risk following release by Nepalese police
November 21, 2016
By Edward Wong
New York Times, November 18, 2016 – Forty-one Tibetans who were detained by the Nepalese police while they were on a bus bound for India have been released to a Nepalese human rights group, an advocated for Tibetan rights said Friday.
The advocate, Kate Saunders, of the International Campaign for Tibet, said early Friday in London that the human rights group, the Human Rights Organization of Nepal, and other contacts in Kathmandu, Nepal’s capital, had told her that immigration officials and the police had allowed all the Tibetans to be released.
Ms. Saunders said the Tibetans were mostly from Kham and Amdo, Tibetan regions now ruled by China, and were on a pilgrimage to sacred sites in Nepal and India. It is likely that they planned to go in January to an important Buddhist ceremony, the Kalachakra teaching, in Bodh Gaya, an Indian city, she said.
It is unclear what those Tibetans will do now. They could end up at the Kathmandu transit center of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. From there, many Tibetans make their way to India, against China’s wishes. Ms. Saunders said the Tibetans were in a “very precarious situation.”
The Human Rights Organization of Nepal did not respond to an email asking for an update on the situation of the Tibetans.
The Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of the Tibetans, is expected to teach at the Kalachakra gathering from Jan. 3 to Jan. 14. He offers this teaching regularly at different places, and many Tibetans try to make their way to Bodh Gaya, the site where the Buddha attained enlightenment, when the Dalai Lama travels there from his home in northern India to teach.
In 2012, Chinese security officials detained hundreds of Tibetans after they returned from the Kalachakra in Bodh Gaya. Many of them were released later. The Chinese government opposes the Dalai Lama and calls him a “splittist,” but Tibetans remain devoted to him, and many try to travel to India to see him.
Since a widespread uprising across Tibetan regions in 2008, the Chinese government has increased its security presence on the Tibet-Nepal border and has prevented many Tibetans from leaving. The number of Tibetans making their way to Nepal has plummeted. China is also exercising greater influence over Nepal, and Tibetans in Nepal complain of more detentions there and a ban on anti-China protests.
Ms. Saunders said Chinese officials were making great efforts to prevent Tibetans from traveling to Bodh Gaya this year for the Dalai Lama’s teaching.
“What we know is that the Chinese authorities have tightened controls on Tibetans, in some areas going from house to house to confiscate people’s passports,” she said.
“In the last few weeks, government officials have confiscated passports in the Tibetan areas of Qinghai and Gansu, and according to some sources, also in Sichuan and the Tibet Autonomous Region,” she added. “Some Tibetans who have already arrived in Nepal and India for pilgrimage and for attending the religious ceremony in Bodh Gaya have already been ordered to return, and their families pressured by the authorities.”
“So no doubt for this group of 41, things will be very difficult,” she said, “particularly given that they will now be on the radar of the Chinese authorities in Nepal, given the nature of the relationship between the two governments.”

China orders neighbouring Mongolia to scrap Dalai Lama visit
November 21, 2016
Associated Press, November 18, 2016 – China on Friday demanded its northern neighbour, Mongolia, scrap a visit by the Dalai Lama, labelling the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader a separatist who seeks to alienate Chinese-controlled Tibet from Beijing.
The 81-year-old monk is starting a four-day visit to predominantly Buddhist Mongolia on Friday evening. His visit is being described by his hosts as purely religious in nature and no meetings with officials are planned.
Despite that, China’s Foreign Ministry reiterated its rigid opposition to all foreign travel by the Dalai Lama, who has been based in India since fleeing Tibet during an abortive uprising against Chinese rule in 1959.
The Dalai Lama is a “political exile who has long been engaging in splitting China activities in the name of religion with the aim of alienating Tibet from China,” ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said.
“We strongly demand that Mongolia, for the purpose of maintaining the general picture of a sound and steady development of bilateral ties, earnestly stick to its commitment on Tibet-related issues, does not allow the visit by the Dalai Lama and does not provide any form of support and convenience to the Dalai Lama clique,” he said.
Mongolia’s herding and resource-centred economy is heavily dependent on China and the country is currently in negotiations for a $4.2 billion loan from Beijing to help pull it out of a deep recession.
Mongolian Buddhism is closely tied to Tibet’s strain and traditionally reveres the Dalai Lama as a leading spiritual figure. The Dalai Lama made the first of his eight visits to Mongolia in 1979, when the country was still under Communist rule.

Face-off over pipeline at India-Tibet border
November 7, 2016
Times of India, November 6, 2016 – Unfazed by the “sit-in” by the Chinese border guards at Demchok in Ladakh that led to a face-off with Indian troops earlier this week, Army engineers have finished the work for laying a water pipeline for irrigation purpose for local villagers in Ladakh division.
China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) troops had entered the area near the Line of Actual Control (LAC) and stopped the construction work. The Chinese troops took positions on the perceived LAC and demanded that work be stopped as both sides need to seek permission before undertaking any such activity. This claim was disputed by the Indian side which said that the terms of the agreement between the two countries state that information about construction needs to be shared only if meant for defence purposes.
The sources said that while the face-off between the two sides continued for three days ending Saturday evening, the Army engineers, ignored the warnings by PLA personnel and continued laying pipeline for nearly a kilometre for irrigation purpose of the villagers in Demchok, located 250km east of Leh.
According to the sources, the formula of ‘active patrolling’ adopted by the ITBP and Army ever since 2013 fortnight long stand-off near Daulat Beig Oldie has been reaping rich dividends and Chinese have been cautious in carrying out incursion especially in Ladakh sector.
This time also, the sources said, army and ITBP personnel did not allow the PLA guards to erect the hut and they were forced to take the material back to their base camp located a kilometre away at Demqog from the place of face-off.
The fresh incident had erupted on November 2 when Chinese troops took positions on the LAC and demanded that work be stopped as either side needs to take permission from each other before undertaking any construction work, a claim disputed by the India which says that as per the agreement between the two countries, information about construction needed to be shared only if it was meant for defence purposes.
Both sides pulled out banners and have been stationed on the ground, the sources said, adding the Army and ITBP troopers were not allowing the Chinese “to move an inch” ahead despite the PLA claiming that the area belonged to China.
The area had witnessed a similar incident in 2014 after it was decided to construct a small irrigation canal at Nilung Nalla under the MNREGA scheme which had been a sore point with the Chinese.
The PLA had mobilised villagers from Tashigong to pitch Rebos (tents) at Charding-Ninglung Nallah (CNN) Track Junction to protest Indian action.

Larung Gar evictees forced to attend political classes back home
November 7, 2016
Radio Free Asia, November 4, 2016 – Monks and nuns expelled from Sichuan’s Larung Gar Buddhist Institute are being subjected to months of political “re-education” after returning to their home towns, with some targeted for periods of detention of up to half a year, Tibetan sources say.
One group of about 100 who came to Larung Gar originally from counties in the Tibet Autonomous Region and were sent back in August have been held for two months in the TAR’s southeastern county of Nyingtri (in Chinese, Linzhi), one area resident told RFA’s Tibetan Service.
“The rehabilitation of those displaced monks and nuns requires the study of Chinese policy and regulations regarding Tibet,” RFA’s source said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The classes, which are conducted in Tibetan with the help of overhead projectors, also promote “awareness of China’s program of subsidized support for Tibetan nomads and farmers,” the source added.
Most of those initially enrolled in the class have now returned to their family homes, but for some who remain behind, the program still continues, the source said.
Chinese officials in Larung Gar’s Serthar (Seda) county had sought the help of TAR authorities to facilitate the return to Tibet of the expelled monks and nuns, some of whom were told they would be allowed to go back to Larung Gar “after a period of time,” he said.
Meanwhile, about 300 monks and nuns who were sent back in September to Riwoche (Leiwuqi) county in the TAR and to Sershul (Shiqu) county in Sichuan were ordered to report to the police on their return, the source said.
“They were then put into detention to be ‘patriotically re-educated,’” he said.
Speaking separately, another Tibetan source confirmed that political classes were being held for Larung Gar evictees across the region.
“All those who have been forced to leave Serthar have to undergo patriotic re-education for about six months on arrival in their home localities,” he said.
Around 3,000 monks and nuns have already been expelled from Larung Gar, and around 1,000 dwellings destroyed, as authorities seek to reduce the population of the sprawling complex by about half to a maximum level of 5,000 next year, sources say.
Reported by Sonam Wangdu and Lhuboom for RFA’s Tibetan Service. Translated by Dorjee Damdul. Written in English by Richard Finney

Sikyong Meets with the Speaker of the House of Commons and Gives Interview to BBC World News Television
Source:tibet.net
1 November 2016, London: Sikyong Dr Lobsang Sangay yesterday met with Rt. Hon Speaker of the House of Commons, in the Parliament House. The Speaker warmly welcomed Sikyong to the British Parliament and enquired about his stay in the UK. The Speaker recalled the time when he hosted His Holiness the Dalai Lama to the Parliament and mentioned what a great honour and privilege that was. He expressed his strong support for the non-violent and just cause of Tibet. Later, when the Sikyong was seated in the House of Commons in the Gallery to watch a debate that was in progress on the floor of the House, the Speaker acknowledged the presence of Sikyong in the House. He said ‘I acknowledge the presence in the House today of Lobsang Sangay, the Sikyong (or) Prime Minister of Tibetan Government in exile. It is a privilege and honour to welcome you, Sir.’’
Earlier in the day, Sikyong Dr Lobsang Sangay addressed the meeting of All Party Parliamentary Group for Tibet (APPGT) in the UK Parliament, chaired by Tim Loughton, MP and attended by among others, ten Members of Parliament representing three political parties in the UK Parliament. In his address, Sikyong mentioned about the destruction of Larung Gar, the largest Buddhist institute in the world, resulting in the forced expelling thousands of monks and nuns. He also touched upon the significance of Tibet, as roof of the world and source of major rivers, to the rest of Asia. He urged the MPs and Tibet supporters to stand up for the democratic ideals and principles and support restoration of freedom for Tibetans.
In the afternoon Sikyong spoke to a house full of members of Henry Jackson Society, a think tank working to advance democracy and real human rights, chaired by Fabian Hamilton, MP (and former Chair of APPGT). He spoke on Tibetan democracy in exile and the future of Sino-Tibetan relations and his speech was well received by those present, who engaged Sikyong with a wide range of interesting questions.
The Sikyong then appeared on the BBC World News television, where he was interviewed by Halda Yakim, which was telecast live to the world audience. He then gave a brief interview to BBC Chinese service.
In his interview to the BBC World News television, Sikyong expressed collective prayers and aspirations of the Tibetan people for successful reincarnation of His Holiness the Dalai Lama. He called upon the word leaders to stand by their national values and principles in their dealings with China. Sikyong also emphasised the wide scale demolition of Tibetan monasteries and nunneries and in the same breath, mentioned the undefeated spirit of the Tibetans who have successfully revived the Tibetan monasteries and nunneries in Tibet.
Overall the day was productive in creating greater awareness on the Tibetan issue.
-Report filed by the Office of Tibet, London-

Tibetan monk detained, beaten after solo protest
October 24, 2016
Radio Free Asia, October 19, 2016 – Chinese police in Sichuan’s Ngaba county detained and beat a Tibetan monk this week, leaving him hospitalized with severe injuries after he staged a solitary protest opposing Beijing’s rule in Tibetan areas, according to a local source.
Lobsang Tsultrim, a monk in Ngaba (in Chinese, Aba) county’s Kirti monastery, was taken into custody at around 1:00 p.m. on Oct. 17 after shouting slogans while walking along a street in Ngaba county’s main town, a resident of the area told RFA’s Tibetan Service.
“He called out for Tibetan freedom and for the long life of [exiled spiritual leader] the Dalai Lama as he walked, and when he arrived at the street in front of the Tibetan Language Middle School he was stopped by police and taken away,” RFA’s source said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Tsultrim was then severely beaten by police and held overnight at a court house in the town, the source said.
“He was rushed to Ngaba Hospital the next day and is now reported to be in critical condition,” he said.
On Oct. 18, a group of Chinese police went to Kirti to question monks about the incident, and the presence of police and security officers has now been strengthened throughout the town, RFA’s source said.
Repeated protests
Ngaba’s Kirti monastery and the county’s main town have been the scene of repeated self-immolations and other protests in recent years by monks, former monks, and nuns opposed to Chinese rule.
Two days before Tsultrim’s protest, Kirti monastery had begun a four-day event marking completion of a lavish new residence for the monastery’s abbot, who lives in Dharamsala, India, seat of Tibet’s government in exile.
Restrictions imposed on the celebration by authorities, including the banning of local students then on their holiday break, “had become unbearable, and these may have triggered [Tsultrim’s] protest,” RFA’s source said.
Sporadic demonstrations challenging Beijing’s rule have continued in Tibetan-populated areas of China since widespread protests swept the region in 2008.
A total of 145 Tibetans living in China have set themselves ablaze in self-immolations since the wave of fiery protests began in 2009, with most protests featuring calls for Tibetan freedom and the Dalai Lama’s return from India, where he has lived since escaping Tibet during a failed national uprising in 1959.
Reported by Kunsang Tenzin for RFA’s Tibetan Service. Translated by Karma Dorjee. Written in English by Richard Finney.

China says it will retaliate after Slovak president meets Dalai Lama
October 17, 2016
Reuters, October 17, 2016 – China’s Foreign Ministry said on Monday it would retaliate after the president of Slovakia, Andrej Kiska, met visiting exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, a man accused by Beijing of promoting independence for the Himalayan region.
China regards the 80-year-old, Nobel Peace Prize-winning monk as a separatist, though he says he merely seeks genuine autonomy for Tibet, which Communist Chinese troops “peacefully liberated” in 1950.
The Dalai Lama, who is on a trip to Europe, met President Kiska on Sunday over lunch in Bratislava, the Slovak capital, according to the Dalai Lama’s official website. The site showed a picture of the two men chatting.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said Kiska had ignored China’s “strong opposition” to the meeting, which was contrary to the “one China” policy the Slovak government has promised to uphold.
“China is resolutely opposed to this and will make a corresponding response,” Hua told a daily news briefing in Beijing, without giving details.
A posting on the Slovak president’s Facebook page on Oct. 16 carried pictures of the meeting with the Dalai Lama, and a note from President Kiska describing it as “a privilege”.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua said the Dalai Lama has long tried to separate Tibet from China and the government opposes any foreign official having any form of contact with him. The meeting has “broken the political basis of China-Slovak relations”, Hua said.
“We demand the Slovak side clearly recognize the anti-Chinese separatist nature of the Dalai Lama clique and earnestly respect China’s core interests and major concerns.”
Slovakia should take steps to eliminate the negative impact of this meeting, she added.
China also expressed anger last month and threatened countermeasures after the Dalai Lama spoke at the European Parliament in the French city of Strasbourg and met its president, Martin Schulz.
Few foreign leaders are willing to meet the Dalai Lama these days, fearful of provoking a strong reaction from China, the world’s second-largest economy.
The Dalai Lama fled to India in 1959 following a failed uprising against the Chinese.
Rights groups and exiles accuse China of trampling on the religious and cultural rights of the Tibetan people, charges strongly denied by Beijing, which says its rule has brought prosperity to a once backward region.
(Reporting by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Kenneth Maxwell)

China’s demolition of Larung Gar is ‘inhuman’, ‘unconstitutional’: Former Tibetan PM-in-exile
October 17, 2016
Business Standard, October 11, 2016 – Former Tibetan prime minister-in-exile Samdhong Rinpoche has termed demolition of Larung Gar Monastery and eviction of thousands of monks and nuns in his homeland as inhuman and unconstitutional.
Rinpoche said it was not for the first time that Chinese authorities had completely demolished Larung Gar, as a similar drive was carried out in 2002-03 after which the monastery was reassembled day by day.
“I think the Chinese government is more concerned those people who from mainland China and they are coming there more and more and become a big monastic institution so they are doing it again so what I can it is just condemning the act is not enough. It is inhuman and it is against their own constitution,” said Rinpoche.
Larung Gar, a valley in the China-administered Sichuan province in East Tibet, where thousands of monks, nuns and students, who come to study, reside and live together. The population of over 40,000 comprises primarily monks and nuns, making it one of the largest religious institutions in the world.
Exiled Tibetans and rights groups say China, which took control of Tibet in 1950, has tried to stamp out religious freedom and culture in the Himalayan region. China rejects the criticism, saying its rule has ended serfdom and brought development.
(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated ANI feed.)

Hundreds of Chinese officials target Larung Gar residents for eviction
October 10, 2016
Radio Free Asia, October 6, 2016 – Hundreds of Chinese officials have descended on Sichuan’s Larung Gar Buddhist Institute in recent days to question resident monks and nuns about their residency status in order to target them for removal, sources in the region say.
The officials, many of them coming from Tibetan-populated areas outside Sichuan, are now busily going door-to-door collecting information, a resident of the area told RFA’s Tibetan Service this week.
“Recently, over 300 government officials from different provinces, prefectures, and counties arrived at Larung Gar,” RFA’s source said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“They are gathering names and information regarding the hometowns and monasteries of the monks and nuns, and are recording all of this [to select individuals for eviction],” the source said.
“At the request of the senior teachers and abbots of the Institute, the monks and nuns are cooperating with these investigations without displaying anger or irritation,” he said.
Many thousands of Tibetans and Han Chinese study at the Larung Gar complex, which was founded in 1980 by the late religious teacher Khenpo Jigme Phuntsok and is one of the world’s largest and most important centers for the study of Tibetan Buddhism.
The order now to reduce the number of Larung Gar’s residents by about half to a maximum level of 5,000 by Sept. 30 next year “comes from higher authorities,” with China’s president Xi Jinping taking a personal interest in the matter, sources told RFA in earlier reports.
Dwellings destroyed
Chinese work crews meanwhile continue to demolish structures at the sprawling religious complex in Sichuan’s Serthar (in Chinese, Seda) county, with 550 houses torn down between July 20 and Sept. 23, a source at Larung Gar with close knowledge of the situation said.
Authorities have targeted a total of 1,000 monastic dwellings for destruction by the end of this year alone, sources say.
“The list of monks and nuns to be removed from Larung Gar this year must be reported to senior officials by Oct. 30,” RFA’s source said.
Rights groups have slammed the government-ordered destruction at Larung Gar, with New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) saying that Beijing should allow the Tibetan people to decide for themselves how best to practice their religion.
“If authorities somehow believe that the Larung Gar facilities are overcrowded, the answer is simple,” HRW China director Sophie Richardson said in a statement in June, when the plan to destroy large sections of the complex was first announced.
“Allow Tibetans and other Buddhists to build more monasteries.”
Reported by Lhuboom for RFA’s Tibetan Service. Translated by Karma Dorjee. Written in English by Richard Finney.

New dam will divert water from nomadic herding area in Tibet
October 3, 2016
By Joydeep Gupta
The Third Pole, October 2, 2016 – There is much unease in the Indian media following an announcement by China that it has completed the dam for a hydroelectricity project at Lalho on the Xiabuqu river in Xigaze prefecture of the Tibet Autonomous Region. Xiabuqu is a tributary of the Brahmaputra, called Yarlung Zangbo in Chinese.
Xigaze was earlier known by its Tibetan name Shigatse. Its provincial capital – by the same name – has been famous as the historic seat of the Panchen Lama.
The unease in India is due to the fear that the project will reduce the flow of water in the Brahmaputra, which flows through the Indian provinces of Arunachal Pradesh and Assam before moving into Bangladesh. However, like other recent hydroelectricity projects in Tibet, Lalho is a run-of-the-river project, which will not reduce water flow once it is complete. The dam is for diverting the water into a tunnel.
It will, however, impact the flow of silt, essential to the build-up of soil in the South Asian plains.
The Lalho project is well upstream of the “great bend” made by the Brahmaputra shortly before it enters India. Other tributaries joining the Brahmaputra in and around the great bend double its water flow before the Arunachal Pradesh border. Larger tributaries join the river in India, so that it carries eight times more water when it exits the country than when it enters.
Bigger problem
The far bigger problem with the Lalho project is that it will more or less dry up a long stretch of the Xiabuqu river in an area that is already suffering from rapid desertification. As most of the water is diverted through a tunnel to produce electricity, the already serious water shortages faced by herders living along its banks will worsen.
In the Xigaze area, much of the soil along both banks of the Brahmaputra is eroded, with stretches of sand dunes and desert. The Chinese government blames a combination of prolonged drought and overgrazing, while the herders blame dams upstream in various rivers of the Brahmaputra basin.
The Chinese government has been defending its string of hydroelectricity projects in Tibet with the plea that the region is chronically short of energy . While that is correct right now, its 13th five year plan forecasts more large hydropower stations in Tibet in the next four years, with total generation far in excess of projected demand. The government also argues in hydropower from Tibet will be sent to industrial hubs in southern China via long distance transmission lines in due course, helping the country shift away from dirty coal.
The Chinese government has been keen to sell the excess electricity to India. This was one of the main reasons why it agreed to Indian requests for Brahmaputra flood season water flow data and expanded the agreement in October 2013. In 2015, China started generating electricity from the $1.5 billion Zam Hydropower Station, the largest in Tibet and built on the main stem of the Brahmaputra.
But given the current tension between India and Pakistan and China’s support to Pakistan, it is unlikely that the Indian government will agree to buy electricity from China in the foreseeable future. Some commentators in India have said the Chinese announcement of the Lalho project is timed to send a warning to India, which has suspended the regular meetings of commissioners meant to implement the India-Pakistan Indus Waters Treaty in the wake of a terrorist attack that killed 19 Indian soldiers.
The Lalho project will need an investment of 4.95 billion yuan ($740 million), making it the most expensive hydroelectricity project of its kind, according to Zhang Yunbao, head of the project’s administration bureau. Construction on the project began in June 2014. Now that the diversion dam has been completed, it may be ready on schedule by 2019.