Washington DC: This week, Tufts University announced its plan to close its Confucius Institute. This is all largely thanks to the tireless advocacy and organizing by the Tibetan Association of Boston, Students for Free Tibet, Boston Uyghur Association, Tibet Action Institute, Hong Kong Social Action Movements Boston, Taiwanese community members, and Chinese community members.
According to the SFT press release, the campaign to close the Confucius Institute spanned over two years, and the organizers spent 13 consecutive weeks protesting up until its closure.
“The Chinese Communist Party is also responsible for the deaths of over a million Tibetans since its illegal occupation of Tibet started in 1959. I am Tibetan. My parents fled Tibet by foot when they were six and eight years old, through the Himalayas, to escape persecution,” Olo Bayul, President of the Tibetan Association of Boston and local teacher, testified prior to the Confucius Institute’s closure announcement.
“We are very horrified that in a freedom-loving place like in Somerville, in Medford and in America, that there is an arm of that very regime that haunted my parents, in our backyard at Tufts.”
Other than Olo, other leaders in this project are Rushan Abbas, Maya Mitalipova, Pema Doma, and Lhadon.
- filed by Office of Tibet, Washington DC