No let-up in unfair and harsh sentencing of Tibetans by Chinese government

[Saturday, 15 May 2010, 2:56 p.m.]

Lhamo Kyab, a retired Tibetan school teacher, sentenced by the Chinese government without fair trial to 15 years in jail

Dharamshala: The repressive trends of arbitrary arrest and handing down of harsh prison sentences on Tibetan scholars and teachers by the Chinese government continue unabated, as a Tibetan school teacher in Tibet’s Nagchu Prefecture was sentenced to 15 years in jail in January this year.Without maintaining the standard of legal process and denying fair trial to Lhamo Kyab in the Chinese constitution, the Chinese authorities had handed down the unfair verdict after interrogating her for almost two years at a detention centre.

Tashi Rabten

According to reliable information received by the Central Tibetan Administration, Kyab was arrested in mid-2008 for her alleged involvement in political activities when she was teaching at a primary school at Driru County in Nagchu Prefecture.  The source said officials from the China’s intelligence bureau arrested Kyab on the third night of her joining the school, and was whisked away with head covered with a black scarf to her home in Nagchu. They raided her house before taking her to a secret detention centre in Sangyib, where she was kept and interrogated till she was given the harsh prison sentence in January 2010. The source have no knowledge of her whereabouts till date.Lhamo Kyab, daughter of Mr. Dhondup, was born to Nyenpatsang family in Nagchu. She was the only daughter amongst the three children in the family. After finishing her school education she completed teaching course from the teacher training school in Nagchu. She then taught Tibetan and Chinese languages in addition to Mathematics at the local school for 25 years since 1982. During her teaching career she did not join the Chinese communist party due to which she remained without any official position. Nevertheless, the local Tibetans, including government officials, students and general public, respect her as a “person sincerely committed in educating Tibetan students about Tibet’s culture and traditions”.Tibetan Scholars Arrested and Tortured

Tagyal

The Chinese government has started executing measures to arbitrarily arrest sections of Tibetan intellectuals under the pretext of levelling allegations of Tibetans’ engaging in political activities.In Machu County, the local government authorities expelled a group of Tibetan middle school’s teachers and detained students and remaining teachers. Around 21 teachers were fined.  Moreover, teachers of Machu primary school and around 5 teachers of Barkham teacher training school were also arrested.In another case, a group of students at a primary school in Driru County were also detained. Similarly, a student and writer named Tashi Rabten from Northwestern Tibetan Nationality Senior School, who is a native of Dzoge, was also detained without any charges last month. Also taken into police custody for not committing any offence was Sangchu county’s Drongbhu, who is also a student and writer at the same school.

Drongbhu

On 23 April, Tagyal, who goes by the pen name Shogdung, a prominent Tibetan scholar was arrested in Siling. Tagyal, aged 45, is a Tibetan writer and staff member at the Tsongon Nationalities Publishing House. According to New Tang Dynasty Television, Tagyal and seven other Tibetan intellectuals signed an open letter on 17 April. The letter urged citizens to donate food and clothes to victims of the recent earthquake—but warned against possible corruption by officials. It said, “just as the news from the mouthpiece for the [Communist] Party organisations cannot be believed, we dare not believe in the Party organizations.” It’s unclear whether police arrested Tagyal specifically because of the letter. Earlier this year he had published a book critical of the Chinese regime’s actions during the 2008 peaceful protests in Tibet, the NTDTV report said.