Human rights in Tibet

Human rights in Tibet have become a contentious issue, both prior to and after the Chinese takeover in 1950. Human rights abuses have existed prior to the Chinese Communist take over under Tibet's serfdom system. Since then, the Chinese Communist Party strictly controls information about, and access to the Tibetan Autonomous Region and other Tibetan areas of the People's Republic of China (PRC), which makes gaining an accurate picture of the scope of human rights abuses in these areas difficult. The Chinese government has intensified such controls following the 2008 Tibetan unrest.

According to Tibetan activist groups abroad, the Tibetan people are denied rights guaranteed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights such as the right to self-determination, freedom of speech, assembly, movement and expression. According to Amnesty International, violations of human rights include the imprisonment of prisoners of conscience and of other political prisoners after unfair trial, as well as torture and other ill-treatment of detainees, the death penalty, and extrajudicial executions. Some laws in Tibet restrict basic freedoms consistent with international standards. The preservation and development of Tibet's religious, cultural, and linguistic heritage is also at risk.

Background

Prior to the Chinese takeover

Main article: Serfdom in Tibet controversy

In the political debate regarding the nature of pre-Communist Tibet, Chinese sources assert human rights abuses as a justification for the Communist invasion. Sympathisers of Chinese government's position view the pre-1950's abuses as justifying the Communist regime in the Tibetan Autonomous Region. Supporters of the Tibetan Government in Exile argue that the 13th Dalai Lama had already effected reforms which were ahead of the world at the time, and that further reforms were underway, and no outside intervention was justified.

Judicial mutilation - principally the gouging out of eyes, and the cutting off of hands or feet - was formalized under the Sakya school as part of the 13th century Tibetan legal code, and was used as a legal punishment until being declared illegal in 1913 by a proclamation of the 13th Dalai Lama. In this same reform, the Dalai Lama banned capital punishment, making Tibet one of the first countries to do so. The 14th Dalai Lama's brother Jigme Norbu reports that, along with these reforms, living conditions in jails were improved, with officials being designated to see that these conditions and rules were maintained.".

Whipping was legal and common as punishment in Tibet including in the 20th century, also for minor infractions and outside judicial process. Whipping could also have fatal consequences, as in the case of the trader Gyebo Sherpa subjected to the severe corca whipping for selling cigarettes. He died from his wounds 2 days later in the Potala prison. Tashi Tsering, a self-described critic of traditional Tibetan society, records being whipped as a 13 year old for missing a performance as a dancer in the Dalai Lama's dance troop in 1942, until the skin split and the pain became excruciating.

Chinese takeover of 1950

Main article: Invasion of Tibet (1950–1951)

Samdhong Rinpoche, the 14th Dalai Lama, and other Tibetans in exile have accused the PRC government of a campaign of terror which led to the destruction of monasteries and disappearance of up to 1.2 million Tibetans. By 1962 only 70 of the original 2,500 monasteries in the Tibet Autonomous Region were left and 93% of the monks were forced out. The "1.2 million" figure for deaths since 1950 dates to a figure from the Tibetan Government-in-exile which they break down to 433,000 through military action, 343,000 through famine, 173,000 through imprisonment, 157,000 through execution, 93,000 through torture and 9,000 through suicide.

These figures are disputed, however, by Patrick French, ex-Director of Free Tibet Campaign in London and supporter of the Tibetan cause. He was able to view the data and calculations from the archives of Dharamsala, and says the total was based on refugee interviews. When examining the raw data, however, he found no names, but "the insertion of seemingly random figures into each section, and constant, unchecked duplication." French estimates that half a million Tibetans died as a result of Chinese policies, "a devastating enough figure, in all conscience, which in no way diminishes the horror of what was done in Tibet.". The official Tibetan census in 1953 recorded a population of 1,273,969.

Under communist Chinese rule

File:Drapchi prison.jpg

An aerial shot of Drapchi Prison, which, according to the Central Tibetan Administration, has gained a notorious reputation for its violent treatment of prisoners.

According to an Asia Watch Committee report in 1988, the question of human rights in a minority area of the People's Republic of China is inherently difficult to research and address. Official sensitivity around the Tibet issue compounds the problem, and the CCP's insistence that there is actually no human rights problem compounds it further.

Tibetans continue to express their rejection of Chinese policies by political protests calling for the Dalai Lama’s return to Tibet and for Tibetan independence or freedom. Government measures to prevent information about Tibetan protests and protesters from leaving China have hindered human rights monitoring organizations from providing an adequate account of protests and their consequences, according to the CECC.

The position of the Communist Party that any discussion of the issue by foreigners is "unacceptable interference in China's internal affairs" is itself an obstacle to scrutiny. The Chinese government has also linked negative remarks about human rights in Tibet with damage to Sino-American relations. This relates to questions about political prisoners, population transfer, and more, which are "hidden in secrecy," according to the report. Thus, gathering information on such subjects with regard to Tibet is a difficult undertaking.

Types of abuses

Human rights abuses documented in Tibet include the deprivation of life, disappearances, torture, poor prison conditions, arbitrary arrest and detention, denial of fair public trial, denial of freedom of speech and of press and Internet freedoms.

The security apparatus has employed torture and degrading treatment in dealing with some detainees and prisoners, according to the U.S. State Department's 2009 report. Tibetans repatriated from Nepal have also reportedly suffered torture, including electric shocks, exposure to cold, and severe beatings, and been forced to perform heavy physical labor. Prisoners have been subjected routinely to "political investigation" sessions and punished if deemed insufficiently loyal to the state.

Physical abuses

File:Tortur2.jpg

A victim of torture, drawn from the archives of the Tibet Centre for Human Rights and Democracy.

In one case a Tibetan from Sichuan province, Paltsal Kyab, died five weeks after he had been detained by police in connection with the 2008 protests. His family was not allowed to visit him while he was detained, and received no news until being informed of his death. When claiming his body, family members found it bruised and covered with blister burns; they discovered later that he also had internal injuries, according to Amnesty International. The police told the family that he had died of an illness, though relatives claimed he was healthy when detained.

Since March 10, 2008, Tibetan sources have documented that 228 Tibetans have died under the crackdown, 1,294 have been injured, 4,657 arbitrarily detained, 371 sentenced and 990 disappeared. Four Tibetans were executed in Lhasa on 20 October 2009, while the Chinese authorities confirmed only two. 11 Tibetans were sentenced to life imprisonment. In the majority of cases the defendants had no independent legal counsel and when a lawyer of choice represented the defendants, the authorities blocked representations either through intimidation or on procedural grounds.

Infringements on religion

Tibetans in Tibet state that there are clear limits on their right to practice Buddhism. They say that generally they are only accorded the freedom to perform certain rituals and to make public displays of some aspects of religious faith.

The CCP further increased its influence over the teaching and practice of Tibetan Buddhism in 2009, including intensifying a media campaign to discredit the Dalai Lama as a religious leader and preventing Tibetans from respecting him as such. Chinese official statements also indicated that the government would select a successor to the Dalai Lama, currently aged 74, when he passes away. Tibetans are expected to "embrace such a development."

Educational, legal, and propaganda channels are used to pressure Tibetan Buddhists to change their religious beliefs into a doctrine that promotes government positions and policy. This has resulted instead in continuing Tibetan demands for freedom of religion and the Dalai Lama’s return to Tibet.

The Dalai Lama's advocacy on behalf of the Tibetan people and culture is used in official propaganda to argue that he is not a legitimate religious leader, but a political actor. Ending the Dalai Lama’s role as supreme religious leader is a core part of the campaign that promotes the CCP's “stability” and “harmony” in the Tibetan areas of China. This was carried out by state-run media and senior government officials. Minister of Foreign Affairs Yang Jiechi, for example, told a press conference in March 2009 that the Dalai Lama is “by no means a religious figure but a political figure.”

In February 2009 The “Tibet Branch” of the Buddhist Association of China changed their charter to pressure Tibetan Buddhist monks and nuns to treat the Dalai Lama as a "de facto criminal" and threat to Tibetan Buddhism, according to a report in China’s state-controlled media. The revised charter urged monks and nuns to “see clearly that the 14th Dalai Lama is the ringleader of the separatist political association which seeks ‘Tibet independence,’ a loyal tool of anti-China Western forces, the very root that causes social unrest in Tibet and the biggest obstacle for Tibetan Buddhism to build up its order.” The CECC argues that incorporating language classifying the Dalai Lama as a “separatist” into the charter of a government-designated religious organization increases the risk of punishment for monks and nuns who maintain religious devotion to the Dalai Lama even if they do not engage in overt political activity.

On March 10, 2010, the Dalai Lama stated that "the Chinese authorities are conducting various political campaigns, including patriotic re-education campaign, in many monasteries in Tibet. They are putting the monks and nuns in prison-like conditions, depriving them the opportunity to study and practice in peace. These conditions make the monasteries function more like museums and are intended to deliberately annihilate Buddhism."

The CCP continued to state that Chinese policies in Tibetan areas are a success, and in 2008 and 2009 took a stance of pressuring other governments to abandon support of the Dalai Lama and instead to support the Party line on Tibetan issues.

'Reshaping' Tibetan Buddhism

The official response to continued criticism of CCP policy from Tibetans includes "aggressive campaigns" of “patriotic education” (“love the country, love religion”) and legal education. Patriotic education sessions require monks and nuns to pass examinations on political texts, affirm that "Tibet is historically a part of China," accept the legitimacy of the Panchen Lama installed by the Chinese government, and denounce the Dalai Lama.

In June 2009, a monastic official who also holds the rank of Vice Chairman of the TAR Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) spoke to monks at Jampaling (Qiangbalin) Monastery in Changdu (Chamdo) prefecture, TAR, and emphasized the dependency of “freedom of religion” on Party control and patriotism toward China. “Without the Party’s regulations,” he told the monks, “there would be no freedom of religion for the masses. To love religion, you must first love your country.”

According to the CECC, Chinese officials justify such campaigns as "legitimate and necessary" by seeking to characterize and conflate a range of Tibetan objections to state policy as threats to China’s unity and stability. An example given to substantiate this is comments made by Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) Party Secretary Zhang Qingli and Vice Minister of Public Security Zhang Xinfeng, speaking during a February 2009 teleconference on “the work of maintaining social stability.” They called for “large numbers of party, government, military, and police personnel in Tibet to immediately go into action” and “resolutely smash the savage attacks by the Dalai clique and firmly win the current people’s war against separatism and for stability.” Principal speakers at the teleconference stressed the importance of "education campaigns" in achieving such objectives.

A Tibetan activist group reported that Chinese authorities in Kardze County and Lithang County in Kardze Tibet Autonomous Prefecture ("TAP"), Sichuan Province, as part of the anti-Dalai Lama campaign, threatened the local populace with confiscation of their land if they do not hand over portraits of the Dalai Lama within a month.

Sovereignty issues

According to W. Gary Vause, Vice President and Dean of Stetson University College of Law, the conflict between Tibetans and the CCP is related to a separatist ideology, but is also a reflection of human rights concerns. He argues that failure to separate the two issues clouds debate about them. "The debate that rages over whether, as the Chinese claim, Tibet historically has been part of China's sovereign lands or whether, as Dalai Lama claims, Tibet is a captive country, taken and held hostage by superior military forces against the will of the Tibetan people, has been viewed by most of the world for many years as an increasingly academic issue," Vause writes.

Neither the United States nor any other member of the United Nations has recognized Tibet as a sovereign state independent of China, and most Western countries, including the United States, recognized China long after it had reasserted its rule over Tibet.

Repercussions of 2008 unrest

Main article: 2008 Tibetan unrest

In March 2008 monks and nuns from monasteries in Lhasa and other Tibetan communities began peaceful protests to mark the anniversary of the 1959 Tibetan uprising. The actions turned into rioting by Tibetans four days later in Lhasa, the capital, and led to a police crackdown resulting in an unknown number of deaths, injuries, arrests, and human rights abuses, according to the U.S. Department of State. The official death toll is 18 civilians and 1 police officer.

It was Chinese government and Communist Party interference with the norms of Tibetan Buddhism, and "unremitting antagonism toward the Dalai Lama," that were key factors behind the protests, according to a special report by the Congressional-Executive Commission on China.

Many members of the People's Armed Police (PAP) remained in communities across the Tibetan Plateau during the year, and the fallout from the protests continued to impact on human rights outcomes for Tibetan people.

According to numerous sources, the U.S. Department of State says, many detained after the riots were subject to extrajudicial punishments such as severe beatings and deprivation of food, water, and sleep for long periods. In some cases detainees sustained broken bones and other serious injuries at the hands of PAP and Public Security Bureau (PSB) officers. According to eyewitnesses, the bodies of persons killed during the unrest or subsequent interrogation were disposed of secretly rather than returned to their families.

Reports of torture and other ill-treatment in detention emerged after the riots, including cases that ended in death. Many monasteries and nunneries remained under virtual lock-down, while the authorities renewed the “Patriotic Education” campaign, according to Amnesty International.

The campaign requires Tibetans to join in "collective criticism sessions" of the Dalai Lama and sign written denunciations against him. Tibetan members of the CCP were also targeted, including being forced to remove their children from Tibet exile community schools where they obtain religious education.

In March 2010 as many as 50 Tibetans were arrested for sending reports, photos, and video abroad, according to Reporters Without Borders (RSF). In some cases long jail sentences were handed down. “The repression has never stopped since the March 2008 uprising in the Tibetan regions,” RSF said. “This persecution of Tibetans who take risks to send evidence of the human rights situation abroad is a tragic illustration of the state of exception that reigns in Tibet. We call for their immediate release," they said in the statement. The convictions included a 10-year prison sentence for at least one individual.

See also

• 2008 Tibetan unrest
• Tibetan Uprising Day
• Tibetan sovereignty debate
• Human rights in China
• Serfdom in Tibet controversy
• Invasion of Tibet (1950–1951)