Japanese Stupa in Lumbini, Nepal

Lumbini, an ancient Buddhist pilgrimage site, is now an arena of conflict; Nepal’s Maoist government is promoting a multi-billion dollar development plan supported by the United Nations with funding from investors with multiple links to the Chinese Communist Party.

Lumbini, the birthplace of the Buddha, lies in the dense forest of southwestern Nepal, 6 kilometers from the Indian border, a Buddhist sanctum in a Hindu nation, surrounded by Muslim villages, abandoned for millennia, unearthed by European archeologists in the 19th century. Today Lumbini is a UNESCO and World Heritage Site and a pilgrimage destination for the world’s 1 billion Buddhists.

Lumbini is also an arena of conflict, as Nepal’s Maoist government advances a multibillion dollar plan to develop the site with the public support of the United Nations, and a group of international investors, many aligned with the Chinese Communist Party.

On March 12, 2012, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon announced plans to visit Nepal in April 2012, to promote the new Lumbini project. Nepal seldom receives envoys of such stature, only one UN Secretary General has ever journeyed to this remote Himalayan nation; U Thant of Burma, a devout Buddhist, came in 1967, also to visit Lumbini.

The Lumbini plan purportedly endorsed by Secretary Ban Ki-moon is controlled by Nepal’s top Maoist, Pushpa Kamal Dahal, known by his revolutionary nom de guerre “Prachanda”, or, The Fierce One. Kathmandu newspapers swelled with voices of concerned citizens asking why would Sec. General Ban Ki-Moon endorse Dahal, a Hindu Brahmin and Supreme Commando of Nepal’s traumatic civil war, as the overseer of a hallowed Buddhist site.

In 1996 Dahal launched his insurgency, Maoist troops violently stormed Nepali villages, looted banks and businesses, slaughtered over 15,000 citizens, kidnapped and tortured men, women and, in great number, children, to hoist rifles for his People’s Liberation Army which conquered the Shah-Rana dynasty and put the Maoists in power.

In 2011 Nepal’s Prime Minister Baburam Bhattarai, appointed Dahal head of the new Lumbini Development National Steering Committee. Dahal – seemingly overnight –procured $3 billion for the project from a dubious Hong Kong agency known as APECF, the Asia-Pacific Cooperation and Exchange Foundation, co-chaired by himself and a one Mr. Xiao Wunan, and other investors with multiple links to the Chinese Communist leadership in Beijing.

Dahal made headlines in 2011 after he went to Beijing, to cut a deal with APECwith the UN Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) scuttling the authority of UNESCO and the senior Lumbini Development Trust. Nepali and UN officials denounced the backroom deal as illegitimate.

On March 21, 2012, a UN spokesperson announced that Secretary Ban K-moon postponed his trip to Nepal, citing concerns about “lack of preparation” by the government. But the project is still in play; in late 2011, the Maoist government hastily declared 2012 “Visit Lumbini Year” without consulting Nepal’s tourist industry leaders. Yang Houlan, China’s ambassador to Nepal made Lumbini his first official sojourn when he assumed his post in 2011.

Journey to Kapilavatsu

Lumbini is one of Nepal’s hidden treasures, an eight-hour drive from Kathmandu through mountain gorges pierced by the Tista River’s turquoise waters, till the road veers south and enters the Terai, where the land is flat, the jungle is thick, and the air is moist.

Maya Devi Mandir, Lumbini, Nepal

As Lumbini draws near, an invisible grace descends. The Maya Devi Temple encloses the ancient bricks of Kapilavatsu, where in the 6th century BC Queen Maya dreamt of a white elephant entering her torso, and where she gave birth to Prince Siddhartha, who took five steps and proclaimed “I am supreme in the world; this is my last life.” Queen Maya died soon thereafter, and Siddhartha’s father kept his son captive within the palace for many years. One night the prince escaped and saw a leper, a beggar and a corpse, whereupon he renounced his kingdom and commenced his quest for enlightenment.

From dawn till nightfall, pilgrim travelers bow and pray before the holy ground, the reverent calm intermittently punctured by a creaking generator pumping water from a pond into parched grass.  Monks gather beneath pipal trees linked by strings of Tibetan prayer flags, lungta, diffusing blessings upon the wind.

In 1978, in partnership with UNESCO, the renowned Japanese architect Kenzo Tange designed a long maiden of red brick with eastern and western zones for the Theravada and Mahayana lineages.  In the course of the hour-long “monastery tour” you wander through sanghas from, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Burma, Vietnam, Korea, Japan, India, China and Nepal and touch all of Asia, in the midst of Nepal’s fecund jungle.

Lumbini is still very much a sacred place, there are some hotels, but no malls or luxury resorts, it is not a “Buddhist Disneyland” as is often reported, not yet. While Lumbini is rich in history and beauty, the local communities are poor, it is an antique land where buffaloes wade through rice paddies, mothers stir dal baat over wood fires, jackals and vultures rule the night. It has remained so for centuries, from the time when the Buddha wandered through these forests, 2500 years ago.

The Dahal- APECF plan proposes a series of luxury hotels and retail outlets, financed by international investors, which has many long term stakeholders concerned about preserving the sanctity of the site and how the local community would benefit.
In October 2011, the US government cancelled its annual contribution to UNESCO.  China made a first-time donation of $8 million. Qatar gave $20 million. UNESCO has been active in Nepal for decades, promoting education, science and culture. The loss of US support leaves a void China can easily fill with its wealth and strategic proximity to Nepal from occupied Tibet. Lumbini, secluded in Nepal’s deep Terai, is now within China’s sphere of influence.

Chairman Mao in the Land of the Buddha

So why is China’s Politburo trying to take control of Lumbini? Many analysts believe one motive is to weaken the stature of the Dalai Lama and other Buddhist teachers whom Beijing regards as political rivals for the narrative of Tibet – and Buddhism — past and future. The Dalai Lama has only been allowed to visit Nepal once, for 6 hours in 1981, where he held a prayer service at Lumbini.

Should the Maoist/Chinese plan to develop Lumbini be approved, the Dalai Lama, the living symbol of the Buddhist faith, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and for 53 years a refugee monk in India, would most certainly be excluded.

The explosion of protest by self-immolation in Tibet has created a public relations nightmare for the Chinese Communist Party. The crisis was ignited by China’s systematic campaign of religious persecution of Tibetan Buddhists; PLA troops control all Tibetan monasteries, monks are forced into communist “re-education” – citizens are killed, arrested and tortured for defending their faith. The Chinese Communist Party has also declared control over the selection of “tulkus”, reincarnate lamas, stating that it will choose the next Dalai Lama, while slandering him as a “Nazi” and “incestuous murderer” at every turn.

Tibetan refugees, who have lived peaceably with their Nepali hosts for 53 years, are now under assault by the Maoist government. Tibetan lamas are still accorded great respect by Nepali people and the “Tibet Brand” has for decades brought tourists and wealth to Nepal, but in anxious gatherings in Kathmandu, Tibetans ponder how they can survive with China’s long hand reaching into what Mao called “Tibet’s Five Fingers”: Ladakh, Nepal, Sikkim, Bhutan and Arunachal.

Lumbini and Nepali Nationalism

The battle for Lumbini has mobilized Nepalis as an issue of nationalism and sovereignty. Shakun Sherchand, president of Concerned Buddhist Citizens of Nepal wrote the following in an open letter to Ban Ki-moon:

“Pushpa Kamal Dahal is an atheist, Maoist Brahmin. He has pointed out repeatedly that power must be captured “through the barrel of the gun”. This is a violation of the Buddhist principle of ahimsa (non violence). Dahal’s criminal track record must be tried in the International Court of Justice. He has given credibility to violence at the expense of more than 15,000 lives. Recently, he has been facing corruption charges of mishandling party funds for personal benefits by his own party comrades.

“He is not ethnically a Buddhist or an evangelical Buddhist nor has he contributed intellectually to Buddhism and Buddhist rights. It would be morally correct for Dahal to step down as the President of Lumbini Development National Directive and replace him with a high thinking Buddhist lama. May you advise Dahal, not to turn the home of Buddha into a war zone, seeking credibility from the UN by tampering on Buddhist rights, starting with Lumbini.”

Kul Chandra Gautam, former Deputy Executive Director of UNICEF and Assistant Secretary-General of the United Nations, said to journalist Mikel Dunham: “The main rationale for UN’s involvement in Lumbini is to spread the culture of peace, not to condone the glorification of violence. It would be most ironic for the Secretary-General of the UN to co-chair a meeting with an unrepentant leader with blood in his hand in the holy birth place of Buddha, who renounced his Kingdom to spread the message of peace and non-violence throughout the world”.

Death threats have been made against Kul Chandra Gautam and the distinguished journalist Kanak Man Dixit, who pointed out many flaws in the Maoist Lumbini scheme. The January 2012 issue of Lalrakshak (Red Guards) called Dixit an “enemy of the people.”  In a 2012 report the Committee to Protect Journalists documented a spike in murders of Nepali journalists under the Maoist government.

Said a senior Nepali Buddhist in Kathmandu; “The Chinese Communist Party destroyed thousands of Buddhist monasteries in Tibet and China, they persecute Buddhist practitioners, they officially label Buddhism “a disease to be eradicated.” They want Lumbini so they can control the future of our faith, to control what they see as a threat to the Communist Party. The world’s Buddhist community should be very concerned about this.”

Lumbini, Tibet, and the Global Buddhist Dialogue

Lumbini is a battleground of symbolism and truth, as China advances its hegemonic ambitions across Asia, whilst struggling to conceal the factional battles raging within the Politburo and the crises of governance erupting across their empire.

There is one force that could vanquish the violent creed of Mao; the world’s one billion Buddhists. Tibetans are an integral part of this global sangha. The contest for Lumbini presents an opportunity to garner support for Tibet – at this calamitous hour – within the global Buddhist dialogue.

It is time to mobilize, to ask, who should define the future of Lumbini? Chairman Mao or Gautama Buddha?

Envoys Lodi Gyari and Kelsang Gyaltsen during their meeting with Vice Chairman of Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference Du Qinglin in January 2010. (Photo: DIIR)

I just happen to come across an article on Indian Express, dated April 2nd, 2012, where it was alleged that China is once again willing to talk to H.H the Dalai Lama if he abandons his “…independence political objective” — one more time I suppose. It further rehashed the non-entity of the exile government and other exile organizations. It was right in the midst of the Olympic demonstrations in 2008, as China was facing one embarrassing media episode after another by Tibetan activists, when they were in a mood to have another talk with H.H’s representatives. It effectively quelled all the international dramas and gave some talking points to the spineless politicians across the globe and moreover allowed China to portray itself as a civilized society and shamelessly parade around as just another normal country. We all know what the outcome was for the talks then, where they categorically refused to entertain any common ground on the issues facing them and instead went on another round of vile name calling on the stature of His Holiness.

Now, with the recent determined self-immolations inside Tibet and outside Tibet which is causing mild international condemnation and defacing China’s image as a tolerably progressive society, they are yet again back to the same old tactic of luring us with a bait. What is surprising is that they have continued to vilify H.H in the meantime and accuse the 1989 Nobel Laureate and internationally recognized man of peace as a prime instigator of the self-immolations. While this allegation is preposterous and only a fool or an apologist would take it seriously; why engage in this double talk at all if they truly wish to resolve the situation inside Tibet? That alone should be enough to ascertain the sincerity of their offer and foreshadow what is to become of the talks if our side decides to entertain it. For the present, the spokesperson for CTA has correctly termed it “unofficial” and dismissed it as “rhetoric” and “repetitive” which was a pointed response and refreshingly le mot juste.

It should be obvious to everybody by now such fruitless dialogue or negotiation does not help Tibet’s cause one tiny bit and it only furthers the myth of flexible China in the international arena. After nine such talks, their position has not changed one bit while ours have gone through seismic alterations – to our own detriment. There is no reason to carry on this facade any further as the end result is easily discernible. It is like watching a movie nine times and hoping it will end differently this time. I believe to further engage in such masquerade would be dishonourable to the memory of those who have given up their lives for our country and to every self-respecting Tibetan.

If our side decides to bite on this offer, as it were, I believe it is time we set forth certain pre-conditions ourselves to protect our own interests in the long run; such as formally requesting a third party presence in the negotiations, preferably a neutral country to facilitate the negotiations or failing that a special UN appointed representative to oversee the proceedings. Maybe even a panel of Nobel Laureates to act as facilitators as they seem supportive of the dialogue process itself and has recently called upon China to talk to H.H the Dalai Lama. Even making such a request will give us legitimacy in the international arena because it will now put the ball in the court of those who push us to negotiate with China and moreover put China in a defensive position where they will appear somewhat unreasonable if they cannot agree to a simple presence of a facilitator which is a common adopted policy in most dispute. This will also showcase the seriousness of our resolve to the Chinese counterparts as up till now they have been used to our submissiveness. I understand the overwhelmingly reluctance China harbour when it comes to others ‘interfering’ with their ‘internal problems’ but apparently has no scruples when they are the instigator in Nepal, Burma, North Korea etc; it is precisely because of that we should pursue that course as it will not only stop us from further engaging in fruitless talks but at the same time placing the burden on their side. If nothing happens, we haven’t lost anything and if something happens, we will definitely gain a foothold that could very well open up new possibilities in the future. It is time for us to take some risks as a community and throw caution to the wind, especially since the dire situation inside Tibet does not appear to be abating anytime soon. This might go a long way in convincing Tibetans inside Tibet that our exile leaders are taking bold initiatives on their behalf instead of flogging a dead horse one more time and might secure their trust and respect — as far as political direction is concerned — because as of right now it is amply clear they have taken the rein in their own hands and are determined to finish it one way or the other. This calls for a visionary leader to take the next step and I hope our Silon Lobsang Sangay la is up for the challenge. I am happy that he has publicly called for UN intervention in Tibet and I sincerely believe this is the next logical step.

This brings up an interesting question as to who should be authorized to negotiate for Tibet’s future; Dalai Lama’s envoys or the representatives of the CTA? H.H is no longer the political head of the Tibetan Diaspora and further more he had repeatedly stated that the issue of Tibet is not about the status of the Dalai Lama but the people of Tibet, both inside and outside Tibet. As such, it would seem peculiar now if the talks are going to be headed by the envoys of H.H as that will only strengthen the Chinese claim that the issue is only about the status of H.H and nothing more. Of course, the CTA can approve the current team or a new team on behalf of H.H as a circuitous way around the delicate face saving procedure and still carry on the talks but I think it might be advantageous for us to rethink that whole scenario; specifically concerning the awkward autonomy of the envoys themselves who technically doesn’t have to answer to Tibetan people’s representatives. Recently, Lodi Gyari, special envoy of H.H had blistered at the suggestion CTA has the authority to appoint the envoys in the future negotiations, delineating a rather sensitive line that has been crossed. On the Chinese side, they have been adamant they will not recognize the exile Government and will only talk to the envoys of H.H. At the same time; it is abundantly clear they mean to belittle the issue of Tibet only to the status of H.H’s own well being and status which does not help further our cause.

One thing is quite clear as it relates to recent self-immolations inside Tibet; China is concerned, not only of possible turbulent times inside Tibet but the potentiality of the spark spreading further inland where the dry leaves of grievances abound and with the recent wide spread exposure of Pawo Jamphel Yeshi on the front pages of international media, the international politicians are slowly throwing their weights behind some sort of engagement on behalf of the Tibetans, if only to stop further bloodshed. What is also clear is that Tibetans inside Tibet are beyond fed up with the Chinese draconian rule and the moreover are willing to take hitherto unseen extreme, heroic, and historic steps to let the world know of their plight. Although the small minded commentators and TV personalities concerned themselves with the Buddhist etiquettes regarding self-immolations, unfortunately helping to derail the focus of the real issues concerning Tibetans under the oppressive Colonial rule, with our own people further exasperating it by engaging in the unnecessary debate over it, the Tibetan people inside Tibet continued the self-immolations unabated. We are human beings first, then a Tibetan, and then a Buddhist; and exactly in that order. It is time we stop letting others define who we are and drawing from the examples set by our martyrs, we choose the time and the place ourselves by refusing to engage in such puerile discussions and draw the focus back to the issue at hand: Oppressive Colonial power and the enslaved natives.

Another thing that could be roughly ascertained is that the Tibetans inside Tibet, as evidenced by their vociferous calls for the return of H.H the 14^th Dalai Lama back to Tibet, would be immeasurably distraught if H.H happen to pass away in exile, without getting the chance to step on the precious soil of his beloved homeland. Such an episode in the future could effectively mar the chances of reconciliation between the Tibetans and their oppressors. I frankly believe Tibetans will not easily forgive such a grave insult, not that I am trying to belittle the other grave atrocities they have committed on the Tibetan people. Coupled with the other grievances at hand, which are many, and with the recent willingness to martyr themselves for their country, that particular incident might be the last straw that breaks the camel’s back and I am afraid it could very well turn violent to the detriment of both. Right now, whatever hardships they may face, they can still envision the happy face of H.H and be content that he is at least safe in exile. As long as H.H the Dalai Lama is alive, there is always hope for them, however slim it might appear to be. Moreover, they would not dare to embarrass H.H while he is alive by engaging in violent acts which he clearly disapproves. Now, with H.H gone and the grief and anguish that will naturally follow, mixed in with the anger and frustration of a generation under the Chinese hard-line policies and the willingness to adopt extreme measures, it is not far-fetched to envision such an unfortunate turn of events in our future. At the risk of being accused of Jingoism, nonetheless, I believe it is of extreme importance for us to have some sort of thought out policies regarding how to deal with such dire possibility in the future and if possible, how best to avoid such a scenario from happening in the first place, and failing that how best to support our brethrens inside Tibet. Because it simply won’t do to just criticize them and wipe our hands clean when they have every right in the world to react that way, however futile it might be. There is a clear distinction between aggression and self-defense and they are not equitable as it is generally made out to be in our rather new age mindset. It is one thing to say violence won’t be the option in our case but quite another to say that violence has never achieved anything positive; for I would like to point out without positive violence on the side of the good, the American Civil War and World War 2 would have ended quite differently and the world would have been quite different today. I, for one, will support any measure they adopt inside Tibet. I just hope they won’t go that route.

It would be advisable for the Chinese leaders to take heed of the escalating situation inside Tibet and seriously engage in comprehensive reviews of their policies in the short term and to effectively resolve the issue of Tibet to the Tibetan people’s satisfaction but I would be wasting my breath. It reminds me of one of Mark Twain’s aphorisms: “Suppose you were an idiot, and suppose you were a member of Congress; but I repeat myself.”

This losar morning, I woke up early, without important works, I had never woken up this early. After an unusually more comprehensive morning prayer-session of more than an hour, daybreak was yet not around the corner. I went out, it was dark, came back in, out and again in, repeatedly, sat on the door-steps, tried to sleep, all in vain, suffocation by the walls made me more worried and finally decided to go out, though did not know where. Walking alone in the streets, aimless and lost, all I wanted was somewhere to go, something that I could keep walking on. I hated that quiet and peaceful city, I wanted to be distracted, distracted away from the flames of burning lives. A flash of consciousness made me realize that I had already reached the Lake by walking more than two kilometers, I sat on a bench facing the lake, I cried, cried loudly.

Never in my life had a losar been so infestive, even those few losars that came when I was the only Tibetan around, I still wished people and got wished and went out for feasts with my non-Tibetan friends. Though 2009 was too announced a No Losar year but feeling of sadness and anxiety was not this intense. But this losar, instead of being happy for being wished, I felt those festive and cheerful people irresponsible and thus neither wished anybody, nor replied to anybody’s wishing and greeting messages. In the afternoon, I got a call from Tibet and he was confused, “Aren’t peace and harmony what they want? But they appear to want exactly the opposite.” As announced, I fasted on losar. Only at midnight, hunger started calling but ignored and kept browsing.

Internet has been my only source of information about the crisis in Tibet and I have been surviving on the net all these days. News of self-immolations and mass protests with alarming frequencies in Tibet, consequent shootings and repressions have kept coming out, but in exile, nothing spectacular has come in response except those which we have always been doing – issuing statements, condemning the Chinese government, appealing the UN, protest marches, hunger strikes, rallies, candle-light vigils, praying, fasting, No Losar, etc. I have been guarding those common news portals, blogs, Facebook, Twitter, even the Chinese dissidents’ websites and waiting eagerly for something note-worthy to appear. After Jamyang Norbu la’s “Igniting the Embers of Independence” and “What Must I Do?” posted on October 18 last year, nothing came. I wonder where our intelligentsia have gone!

With all the resources we have in exile, Tibetans in Tibet seem leading us in our struggle even though they have no freedom – their intellectuals are mostly imprisoned, monasteries are besieged, people are kept under close surveillance, even peaceful protests could mean fatal and cost lives. Even in terms of innovating new ideas for the struggle, they are ahead of us – self-immolations, Lhakar, non-cooperation movements such as non-farming program, are all effective home-grown tactics of struggle. We have our exile government (I still prefer calling it this way), different NGOs, scholars, most importantly freedom, yet instead of leading, being led.

Besides, the Tibetans in Tibet have turned fearless. Ngaba alone had more than 20 cases of self-immolations and many more were said to come if the severe repressions would not cease. Kardze soon followed the trend which swiftly spread to other regions of Amdo and Kham – Golok, Chamdo, Yulshul, Machu, Themchen, Rebkong, and many more will definitely follow. When they can sacrifice their lives for the cause, we cannot even spend some time to think and write something; spend some time to think if there are less risky and cost-effective ways of struggle so that more lives can be saved. Yielding no result whatsoever with more than five decades of appealing and dealing with China has made everybody frustrated and furious and thus this fiery wave of self-immolations is considered to be hard-earned severe ways of protesting and so nobody dares to stop them, anybody dares would be considered obstructing the struggle. I too, during the initial few self-immolations, was very hopeful of something effective had finally begun and wished nobody stopping it. Even our government, unlike earlier, has started saying that it would neither encourage, nor discourage them. However, self-immolations went on and on endlessly with no corresponding effort from our side except repeating those activities which have already been proven ineffective.

Despite being always a staunch advocate of Rangzen, with endless coming out of extremely graphic images and footages of lives engulfed with flames, yet running and shouting for the common cause, I too feel like compromising my stance for the time being in case a new and effective idea comes up that can lead to a breakthrough of any sort which can save the lives that are expectedly in the queue, because any breakthrough with any nature and magnitude would mean breakthrough to both the ideology groups of Rangzen and Ume-lam, why cannot a breakthrough achieved by one group be used as a stepping stone by another? Being a common individual of no importance with democratic freedom, I do not care being blamed for “independence in disguise”, I cherish my freedom of expression.

Since the fruitless ninth round of talks, devolution of His Holiness’ political authority, charter amendment that shrank our exile government to an NGO and especially the recent surge of intensified and extreme ways of protests in Tibet, voices of opposition have turned louder and vocal repudiations of the middle-way stance is often seen. These are clear indications of our diplomatic failure that has led to this anger and frustration among the youngsters. Even our leaders recognize the failure, but still reluctant to switch to other options and resorts, even a hint of possible change if China persists with its arrogance is not seen. Past disagreement from the Rangzen advocates in terms of stance has now become an opposition to the futile way of pursuing the goal itself. Claims of being “more pragmatic” and “easier” have been proven unconvincing. The new strategy of engaging with Chinese people after losing trust with Chinese government too will take centuries to awaken even half of the Chinese population.

With Sherab Tsedor, Bhutuk and especially Jamphel Yeshi setting themselves on fire, flames of burning Tibet have already reached in exile, but we are yet lost – UN has been urged, politicians lobbied, China condemned, so what? Even though the UN will send a fact-finding delegation into Tibet (though very unlikely as we got such promises in the past too), it will raise the currently ongoing crisis but our end goal of national struggle will be forgotten, even if it will not send a delegation to find the facts, facts have already been found, everybody knows there is crisis, there are self-immolations and there is crack-down. The lobbied politicians may raise our issue in their parliaments and even if resolutions get passed, nothing big will come to our main struggle. What difference will it make to condemn the Chinese government (I do not mean it should not be condemned)? Chinese government knows better than us that they themselves are responsible for the crisis in Tibet. A government that has come to power by claiming the lives of 80 million people, one that massacres its own students and one that disguises its own troops with monks’ robes to lead the Tibetan peaceful protests turn violent with arson, looting and killing so as to justify crack-downs (we have all seen this evidence of distributing robes among the soldiers in 2008 pan-Tibet protests), even if pressurized by the international community, that does not matter much.

We have always been in the illusion of others doing something for us – Ban Ki Moon did not even mention Tibet when he visited China in 2010; Obama barely mentioned a bit but said Tibet being an integral part of China; even our host country India, when it comes to China, does anything at its will – rounding up our activists even at the mid of addressing the penal discussion without charges as preventive measures to Hu’s visit; and of course Nepal has almost turned a Chinese province. How lonely we are! Our house has been looted and plundered, family members slaughtered, made flee and the rest enslaved, those fled stay in rented houses but are too subject to abuses by their landlords at their wills. Such is our miserable fate!

Therefore, it is high time we should stop dreaming and start doing. We already have the most important resources our struggle requires: The Tibetans in Tibet are fully awakened and ready to do anything for the cause, they have the maximum courage the fight requires and all modes of communication technologies are at our disposal to organize them into disciplined fighters. They are just waiting for us to give them a call and they are ever ready to oblige.

Now we have only two options – are we going to persist with what we have been doing to keep wasting time or admit our failure and employ new strategies to make use of these aforesaid precious resources to have a result-oriented struggle? These two options are valid both for Ume-lam and Rangzen believers. A very expected argument here is the internationalization of Tibetan issue being an achievement, but then what we need is not moral and verbal support but support that helps us getting freedom and acquiring identity. All helps are but not necessarily helpful.

The need of the time is, therefore, to invest our maximum effort in innovating new effective and pragmatic ideas for the struggle. Everyone of us, from leaders to common masses, old to young, people from different walks of life need to think, talk and debate on new strategies. SFT has started exploring the weak points of the Chinese government. If everybody does so, we will definitely find some loopholes to seize our opportunity.

The Chinese scholar and Tibetologist Wang Lixiong has found one – his Village Autonomy model hits at the CCP’s weak point – it is a cost-effective strategy that can be applied lawfully and also claims to be result-oriented too as Wukan village in Guangdong Province is already an example for us to follow. He opines that our government’s pursuit of genuine autonomy can start with fighting for village autonomy. Under this strategy, instead of passively waiting for the leaders to go through fruitlessly endless negotiations, the villagers themselves take part in the process and become active fighters of village autonomy. They collectively elect village heads to form village council and obey only them, not those appointed ones. In this way, many village councils come together to elect and achieve township committee, and then many township committees to realize district committee, layer by layer, until genuine autonomy is achieved.

What is unique about this strategy is that everybody is an active participant of the struggle. Will the Chinese government arrest every Tibetan? They cannot. Will they arrest the elected village heads? Let them, we will elect again. Another critical feature of this strategy is that this village autonomy does not need to be approved by anybody else but by the villagers themselves. As long as they can persist with their approval, authorities can do nothing but to compromise. Moreover, this strategy does not require protest in the open streets that justify suppression and thus cost-effective. By simply not cooperating with the appointed authorities and disobeying them, this is a classic model of nonviolent strategy expressed through non-cooperation and civil disobedience movements.

Different doubts may arise here – the most obvious one must be that with such tight securities and surveillance systems in Tibet, how can the Tibetans be organized to struggle for autonomy. I think unlike Chinese people, Tibetan people in Tibet are politically already awakened enough to be organized. Whatever happens anywhere in Tibet is soon known here in exile; the election of Kalon Tripa was celebrated and talked-about almost everywhere in Tibet; a perfect example is that a simple call from His Holiness to refrain from wearing skins of endangered animals prompted them to not only stop wearing, but also burning such luxurious and expensive clothes to ashes. So a call from exile will surely activate everyone in Tibet. Another doubt could be that what Chinese can do cannot be done by us, we would be labeled as separatists and cracked-down upon, to this, Wang Lixiong replies, “Not even scared of self-immolations, what else are to be scared of?”

This is one new path that will possibly lead to our set goal of Ume-lam, there might be other paths to be explored for our both the goals if we start trying seriously to be innovative and creative. Thus said, before being possibly labeled as a hypocrite, I should clarify it does not necessarily mean that I have switched my stance to Ume-lam, I will not rest until Rangzen is restored. Our recent intensified anger and frustration is just because we have not got any breakthrough of any kind, to any goal, with all these decades of effort, ideological difference is not a recent development, it has always been there.

Thus, our optimism towards anybody else should end now. Being spiritual people, our moralistic and ethical expectations from the Chinese regime and the west have postponed our struggle to yield result. Our naïve ignorance of the realpolitik has brought us to this present state of crisis. Now we should know we are all alone – those who want to help us are not capable of helping and those capable will not help. It is all on us, ourselves. WE REALLY NEED TO CHANGE!

When Chinese Premiere Hu Jintao flew into New Delhi on March 28, 2012, for the BRIC Summit, he careened onto unfamiliar terrain: a democracy with a free press, where a 27 year old Tibetan refugee, Jamphel Yeshi, walked to a public protest, poured kerosene over his body and lit himself on fire whilst shouting for an end to Chinese atrocities in Tibet. The searing images from India of Jampa Yeshi’s burning body exposed to the world the cost of China’s reign of terror in Tibet, which has been well concealed for 61 years.

To date, at least 33 people inside Tibet have alighted themselves on fire, in public, in defiance of Chinese Communist assaults on their Buddhist faith, but there are no journalists or diplomats to bear witness to the carnage, only raw video that reaches the internet.

There is another potent source of this explosion of Tibetan outrage, which receives negligible international coverage; the covert history of China’s rape and pillage of Tibet’s ancestral lands and waters.  In Asian folklore Tibet is known as “The Western Treasure House, its people have for millennia been careful stewards of this bounteous terrain.  Tibet’s blessing, its remote plateau, is now its curse: China controls the “Third Pole” with an iron fist and there is no one to stop them.

The elemental facts about Tibet are not widely known, yet any map of the Tibetan Plateau reveals the enormous resource and strategic advantage gained by its capture. Tibet is a unique geomorphic entity, its 46,000 glaciers comprise the Earth’s third largest ice mass. This “Third Pole” is a vital component of the planet’s ecosystem, filled with pristine riches of wildlife, minerals, timber and above all, water; Tibet is the fount of the Yangtze, Yellow, Indus, Ganges, Brahmaputra, Chenab, Sutlej, Salween and Mekong, which flow through 11 nations, nourishing three billion people from Peshawar to Beijing. Today, all but one Asia’s great rivers – the Ganges – is controlled at its Tibetan headwaters by the Chinese Communist Party.

In 2000 China launched a vast development project entitled “Xi bu dai fa”, the “Opening and development of the Western Regions” of Xinjiang and Tibet, which together comprise one half of China’s land mass. A massive influx of Chinese settlers, urbanization and forced relocation of nomads swiftly followed. The Xizang railway, which opened in 2006, transports Tibet’s vast supplies of minerals, stone and lumber to the mainland and brings in a flood of Chinese engineers and laborers who have built at least 160 hydro dams across Tibet and have plans for hundreds more.

Chinese engineers now operate multiple dams and mines all across Tibet, polluting the rivers at their source – you can see all of this on Google Earth. The Chinese government dismisses concerns of its own scientists and those of neighboring states, alarmed by a sudden decline in water levels and fisheries. In the 1990’s China refused to sign the UN treaty on transboundary rivers, increased militarization of the Tibetan Plateau and denies journalists and international observers access to the troubled region. Author Michael Buckley who captured rare footage of dam construction in his film “Meltdown in Tibet” observes; “China doesn’t have to listen to anyone on this. China has Tibet, so China has all the cards.” (For Mr. Buckley’s videos and archives visit www.meltdownintibet.com)

When recently asked about the crisis in Tibet, Chinese official media stated: “The Dalai Lama remind us of the uncontrolled and cruel Nazi during the second world war … How similar it is to the Holocaust committed by Hitler on the Jewish!” Many diplomats and journalists are puzzled by China’s obsessive demonization of the Dalai Lama, the distinguished Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, but the Politburo’s Stalinoid hysteria works, squelching any and all rational discussion of China’s exploitation of Tibet’s resources, and subverting attention away from how Chinese mines and dams have created a looming environmental catastrophe on the world’s most populous continent.

NASA Satellite Photograph of the Tibetan Plateau

The preservation and management of Tibet’s glaciers and the rivers they sustain is one of the greatest challenges facing humanity in the 21st century. Tibet’s waters flow through eleven countries, where population growth and industrial development is projected to double within 50 years. The combined effects of rapid development, desertification and water scarcity  has already created extreme cycles of droughts and floods, food shortages and pandemics. The Chinese mainland is also imperiled: in April 2011, Yangtze River water flows were at their lowest level in record. Yet despite irrefutable evidence of the dangers of over-exploiting Tibet’s water resources, the Chinese government will not modify or downscale plans for dams, tunnels, railroads and highways across the Tibetan plateau.

Since Chairman Mao invaded Tibet in 1951, China has administered a huge military infrastructure across the Tibetan Plateau, which gives China a continuous border with Thailand, Burma, Bhutan, India, Nepal and Pakistan, and is now filled with military airfields and PLA battalions. In the coming age of “water wars”, China has a firm hand on the water tower of Asia.

China’s insists that Tibet is “an internal affair of the state” and for decades the world has turned away in uncomfortable silence as the slaughter of a helpless civilian populace continues without impediment or penalty. The Chinese Communist party has for 61 years controlled the narrative, but to ignore Tibet is to misread how the Chinese occupation intensifies environmental, economic and military instability in Asia and the world.

Tsetan, a Tibetan journalist based in Delhi, says; “For years we have protested the desecration of our culture, the yoking of our rives and the mining of our sacred mountains, but China will not listen: they shoot us, torture us, and there is no one to stop them. Now people inside Tibet are driven to burning their bodies to get the world to understand what China is doing to Tibet, and the world had better wake up before it’s too late.”

Tibetan officials during Jamphel Yeshi's funeral, 30 March 2012. (Photo: Tenzin Dorjee)

On 30 March I attended the moving function organised by the Tibetan Youth Congress to honour the memory of Jamphel Yeshi – the latest Tibetan martyr to perform self-immolation. But this was in New Delhi – during the demonstrations led by Tibetan Youth Congress to protest against China’s President, Hu Jintao, who was arriving in New Delhi to take part in the BRICS Summit Meetings.

Sitting there, one thought kept turning in my mind: How many more? Yes, how many more lives must be sacrificed before we – most importantly the Tibetan Leadership – face certain harsh realities. Not knowing the funeral prayers, I penned down the following lines:

How many more?

How many?
How many more?
Yes! How many more lives?
How many more precious lives?
Rather, how many?
How many more deaths?
How many more deaths before –
Before our leaders,
Yes, our leaders including –
The Kashag and the Parliament,
Before our leaders wake up!
Wake up to the reality –
The harsh and brutal reality,
That, with nothing –
Nothing to gain –
And much to lose,
China will Never –
Never, ever walk away –
Walk away from Tibet!

In fact, I briefly showed what I was writing to two other former Centrex members of T.Y.C. who were sitting next to me.

After the prayers Mr Penpa Tsering, the Speaker of the Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, was requested to address the gathering. And, among other things, he too raised the same question: How many more lives must be given up in this manner? But his question was addressed to the United Nations – not that anyone there is likely to hear or bother about his rhetorical question.

The fact and the harsh reality is that we as Tibetans, and most of all the Tibetan leadership, must first answer this crucial question: How many more lives must be sacrificed before we face and accept the harsh reality that hoping and waiting for China to willingly and voluntarily walk away from Tibet and returning Tibet to us in whatever name or form is never going to happen.

From what we are able to confirm, during the recent past, already some thirty self-immolations are known to have taken place inside Tibet. What needs to be emphasised is that there will have been other cases we do not know about. Also, the deaths need not always have been through self-immolation – which is by far the most visible. What about cases of those jumping into rivers or over cliffs and ravines? We just don’t know.

But we do know that since 1949 more than 1.2 million Tibetans have died as a direct result of China’s invasion and occupation of our country. The fact and the reality is that the situation inside occupied Tibet is so desperate the people are driven to resorting to this desperate means of expressing their desire for independence and the return of His Holiness the Dalai Lama to Tibet in freedom and dignity.

Therefore, the question before the Tibetan leadership is:

How many more lives must be sacrificed before the Tibetan Leadership faces the harsh reality that – with no pressure on our part and with nothing to gain and no self-interest – China will never willingly and voluntarily walk away from Tibet and return Tibet to us Tibetans.

Also, how many more lives before our leaders face the reality that, with millions of Chinese settlers pouring into Tibet, time is running out on us to regain a Tibet for Tibetans? Yes, how many more lives before we face these realities and then act accordingly?

The few lines that I have written can be improved. But they will not improve on their own. So also, the situation in Tibet can be changed, but positive change will not come without direct action and an active struggle. But the harsh reality we must face is that, with millions of Chinese settlers moving into Tibet, time is running out and running out fast.

Long life empowerment at Gyang Guthi Monastery by His Holiness Shakya Trizin. Boudha, Kathmandu, Nepal.

Tibetans in Nepal are caught in a crisis that is getting worse, fast.

In 2012 conflict inside Tibet has accelerated and the crackdown on Tibetans in Nepal has intensified. To date, at least 33 people have immolated themselves in public in Tibet whilst shouting for the return of the Dalai Lama. The Chinese military has predictably met all protests with brute force, imposing de facto martial law across all Tibetan regions within the People’s Republic of China. China is exerting effective pressure on the new government of Baburam Bhattarai to control “anti-Chinese separatist forces in Nepal” to quote Xinhua, the official news service of the PRC.

China is now claiming suzerainty over all Tibetan Buddhist ethnic and cultural zones, which span the Himalayan Belt of Nepal, Sikkim, Bhutan, Ladakh and Arunachal Pradesh in India, as it advances its hegemonic ambitions in South and Southeast Asia with a bellicosity that could hardly be categorized as “soft power.”  Chinese engineers are advancing into Nepal from Tibet, building roads and monopolizing trade with a strategic advantage that no amount of western aid or international press coverage can possibly counter.

Chinese security forces are well established all along the Tibet-Nepal border. Since the 2008 Lhasa Uprising, the Chinese military has sealed off most of the mountain passes linking Tibet and Nepal, which has drastically reduced the number of new escapees. Tibetans are at great risk of capture and refoulement at the Nepal-Tibet border with no international monitoring or protection and negligible media coverage.

Tibetans in Kathmandu, once a safe haven for refugees and still a nexus of Tibetan culture, religion and commerce, endure constant harassment, random search and arrest by both Nepali police and Chinese agents. Any expressions of concern for the people inside Tibet are swiftly halted and the organizers punished.

Said a Tibetan businessman born in Kathmandu: “Nepal has become a second Tibet. No one is safe anymore; we have no leadership and no voice in the government. We used to have an office managed by the Dalai Lama’s exile administration and had the protection of the monarchy, but both are gone.”

Nepal: The Lost Santuary

In 1959, Nepal’s King Mahendra defied Chairman Mao and granted protection to refugees from Tibet. The oldest settlements in Nepal, Jawalakhel and Jorpati, were given to the Tibetans as a royal gift from the palace in 1960. Pokhara, set in a valley below the Annapurna massif, is home to four Tibetan refugee camps.  The Swiss Red Cross built Tashi Peykhil in 1962 and Tashiling in 1965. The Chushi Gangdruk created the Paljorling and Jampaling Camps in 1972. There are still many small Tibetan refugee settlements along the border regions from Solokhumbu to Rewalsar.

King Birendra continued his father’s policy of generous refuge for Tibetans when a second exodus began in the 1980’s. Since the March 2008 uprising in Tibet, the refugee passage has dropped from about 6,000 to 8,000 escapees a year to less than 700.  UNHCR continues to operate a Reception Center in Kathmandu, which provides temporary shelter, food and medical care and coordinates with the Indian embassy to process visas for the new refugees. But Nepal is not a signatory to international refugee conventions, thus there is no protection from refoulement, and no support for refugees who have lived in Nepal for 53 years.

About 13,000 Tibetan are registered as refugees with the Nepali government, but a large number of Tibetans are undocumented, thus unofficial surveys suggest that the number of Tibetans in Nepal is at more than 25,000.

For decades, Tibetans operated hotels, boutiques and restaurants, and were Nepal’s first industrialists, building carpet factories that employed tens of thousands of Nepali workers and brought wealth to the Kathmandu Valley.  Exiled Tibetan lamas built monasteries across Nepal, which draw pilgrims and students from across the globe and young Buddhist monks from Nepal’s northern regions. The “Tibet Brand” brings tens of thousands of pilgrims and tourists to Nepal every year. Nepalis can sell Tibetan flags, tee shirts and posters, but Tibetan businessmen are threatened with extortion for hanging a photograph of HH Dalai Lama in an office or hotel lobby.

End of the Monarchy, End of Protection

After the assassination of King Birendra in 2001, the Tibetans refugees lost the protection of the palace. This complex, multi-generational refugee community still living in the old settlements is poor, marginalized, isolated, with no legal protection and no leadership.

Tibetans in Nepal have few allies to counter China’s aggressive intrusions into Nepal’s oversight of the Tibetan refugee populace. In February 2012, 18 Tibetan high school students staged a small protest before the United Nations headquarters in Kathmandu and were arrested and imprisoned for nearly 2 weeks. In April 2012 the BBC filmed another violent arrest of Tibetans in front of the UN offices in Kathmandu. One group scaled the walls of the UN compound and met with a UN representative, but neither the UN nor any diplomatic mission in Kathmandu has the authority to reverse Nepal’s harsh new policy towards Tibetans.

The Dalai Lama’s Central Tibetan Administration based in Dharamshala, India operated a legally registered Tibetan welfare office in Nepal from 1961 until 2006. The office still functions, but in a highly reduced capacity. Policies implemented by former Kalon Tripa Samdhong Rinpoche contributed to the fragmentation of the Tibetan refugee networks in Nepal, with the sale of CTA owned businesses and the termination of CTA security officials at the Reception Center and Kathmandu office. Tibetan exile government officials from India are now fearful of travelling to Nepal. The Dalai Lama has only been to Nepal once; in 1981 he made a six-hour visit to Lumbini, birthplace of the Buddha.

In October 2011, US State department officials visited the old Jawalakhel camp and were followed by 12 armed policemen at every step, and a representative of the Dalai Lama’s office was arrested, without charges or warrant. He was later released after interventions from UNHCR and the US Embassy, but random raids from Nepali security forces have become routine, inciting fear and anxiety further isolating Tibetans refugees from allies and witnesses.

Since the 1990’s, when the Maoist insurgency began, Nepal’s Maoists have targeted Tibetan businesses with extortion and assault, forcing many to close, depriving hundreds of thousands of Nepal workers of employment, mostly in the Tibetan carpet industry, which for decades was Nepal’s largest source of capital and international trade.

Officials from the US Embassy, UNHCR, the Indian Embassy and Nepali government all concur that Chinese pressure, through military exchanges, aid donations and bribery, has been highly successful in isolating and weakening the Tibetan community in Nepal.  Yang Houlan, the current Chinese ambassador to Nepal, has issued several press releases stating that Nepal must be “cleansed of anti-Chinese elements”. His embassy is exerting extreme pressure upon Nepal’s fragile government to deny Tibetans any kind of legal residency status, to restrict all Tibetan economic and cultural activities, to the prevent Tibetan escapees from crossing the Nepal border.

This is a sharp reversal of Nepal’s decades of generous humanitarian treatment of Tibetan refugees. On Nov. 20th 2011, US Ambassador to Nepal, Scott DeLisi, wrote in the Kathmandu Post: “For more than five decades the government and people of Nepal have shown tremendous generosity toward refugees, including the Tibetans who have sought refuge in Nepal and safe passage to India. The United States of America applauds Nepal’s record of steadfast support, even in the face of pressure to change its policy… For the United States, humanitarian protection — not political gamesmanship — is our primary concern, and our focus will continue to be on protecting vulnerable refugees, rather than the politics of their countries of origin…Those who seek to portray our position on Tibetan refugees as anti-China fundamentally misunderstand US policy and the importance we place on upholding universal values, rights, and principles.”

Chinese Inflitration of the Exile Community

The Tibetan community in Nepal is now thoroughly infiltrated with Chinese agents and spies. China maintains a highly effective espionage network of human and cyber intelligence gathering, employing Indians, Nepalis and even westerners, to collect information on Tibetans activities in exile. A large number of these agents are Tibetans from Chinese Occupied Tibet who have been trained in military academies in China and travel on Chinese passports.

Tibetans in Nepal describe being approached by such agents who offer enormous bribes in exchange for abandoning “The Dalai” and “joining us”. If the bribe is refused, agents become hostile, threaten retribution and in some cases attempt kidnapping.

Said a Tibetan businessman in Boudhanath; “These Tibetan spies follow us, call us and harass us on the phone. They threaten you and they mean it. A lot of Chinese agents are shaking down local businessmen and paying the cops to harass Tibetans. It’s hard to know how the Tibetans can survive in this new climate, where the Chinese are treating us like they own us. In the border regions, police are making house-to-house raids looking for Dalai Lama photos. We know of people who got so many death threats that they have fled to India.”

January 2012: Wen Jiabao Visits Nepal

On Jan. 14th 2012, Chinese Premiere Wen Jiabao, made a 6-hour visit to Kathmandu. In official meetings he asked for specific details on the number and status of Tibetans in Nepal and made clear that the Tibetan community is to be repressed as a condition for Chinese investment and aid.

Wen’s visit was timed to coincide with the return of 9,000 Tibetan pilgrims who entered Nepal in December 2011 en route to India, to attend the Dalai Lama’s Kalachakra teaching in Bodhgaya, the site of the Buddha’s enlightenment in the 6th century BC. The majority of Tibetan pilgrims travelled to Nepal on Chinese visas, by road and air, leaving their passports in Nepal and entering India overland so no Indian visa or official record would appear in their travel documents. Radio Free Asia reports that pilgrims returning to Tibet from India have been arrested, most have been sent to a detention center in Shigatse, where they are subject to beatings, torture and communist re-education, many have been “disappeared.”

After Wen’s visit, surveillance, harassment and intimidation of Tibetans in Nepal has visibly increased, also targeting Nepali citizens who practice Tibetan Buddhism and resemble Tibetans in dress and custom, Sherpas, Tamangs, Manangs, inciting confusion and conflict in Nepal’s Buddhist communities.

There is a visible spike in anti-Tibetan media coverage in the media.  Kantipur, Nepal’s largest selling Nepali language newspaper, regularly prints anti-Tibetan editorials and diatribes. The Kathmandu Post, The Himalayan and Republica, the three leading English language papers, report on Tibetan events with a strong anti-Tibetan bias, frequently casting Tibetan protestors – who are small in number and never violent – as threats to national security and obstacles to China-Nepal relations.  This negative reporting incites suspicion and paranoia about Tibetans in Nepal, which the fractured refugee community does not have the means to contest or alleviate.

Some Nepali writers have criticized the excessive use of force by police officers at Tibetan gatherings and express concerns that China’s assault on their Tibetan neighbors is a threat to Nepal’s sovereignty, but these opinion pieces are very small in number.

Said a Tibetan journalist who was born in Nepal and works in Kathmandu; “In the last year, a new attitude towards Tibetans has appeared. We are now seen as obstructing good relations with China. When people find out you are a Tibetan, they don’t want to work with you, even though so many Tibetan been productive residents of Nepal for more than 50 years.  Now we cannot get residency papers or exit permits, so we can’t go and can’t stay. We are pawns in a game; so many young people are desperate now and feel that they have no choice but to get out, even though they we born here and want to stay here.”

March 10th, 2012 In Kathmandu

On March 10th, the 53rd anniversary of the Lhasa Uprising was observed throughout the Tibetan exile community in India and Nepal. Prior to the murder of King Birendra in 2001, Tibetans would gather at the great Stupa of Boudhanath, where a member of Nepal’s Royal family would stand beside the Dalai Lama’s representative and read aloud a statement of support in Nepali. In the late 1990’s the police presence started to grow and the event frequently ended with minor scuffles, but in the last 10 years the Nepali security presence has grown so large and so lethal it far outnumbers the number of Tibetans who gather for the vigil. Many are beaten and arrested at once, and are thereafter on “watch lists” and subject to constant surveillance and harassment.

On March 10th 2012, a small gathering of Tibetans convened at Sherap Ling Monastery in Boudha. A large contingent of Nepal police stood guard outside the monastery while undercover agents moved conspicuously through the vigil. When the ceremony concluded the Tibetans fled to their homes, chased by police who entered homes and monasteries in an extremely aggressive and hostile manner, chasing monks and students with lathi sticks, threatening journalists or western observers who questioned the unwarranted use of force.

Western diplomats in Kathmandu witnessed several hundred Nepali police at the Chinese embassy in Kamalpokhari, equipped with shields, guns, handcuffs and batons, surrounding a group of 20 Tibetans. On March 14th, 2012, the 4th anniversary of the Lhasa Uprising of 2008, at least 70 Tibetans were arbitrarily arrested across Kathmandu Valley. Police also assaulted many Nepalis. Said a Nepali tour operator who happened to be passing Svayambunath Stupa, where many Tibetans live: “Police stopped our car and pulled my wife out and questioned her simply because she was wearing a maroon shawl, which is the color of a monk’s robe. We saw monks being pulled off of buses, children and young men being beaten by police.”

A senior Nepali official of the Home Ministry stated  “China’s number once interest in Nepal is the Tibetan refugees: they have detailed files on all the Tibetans in Nepal.” Chinese officials insist that Dalai Lama, whom they refer to as ‘The Separatist’, has a large, well-financed network of agents operating in Nepal and Tibet who are a “threat to national security.” Anyone who has visited the Dalai Lama’s exile home in Dharamshala knows that the Tibetan refugee community is small, fragile and poor, but this propaganda is aggressively pushed by Chinese officials along with financial inducements to regard Tibetan refugees as hostile and dangerous elements.

A 28 year old Tibetan who recently escaped to Nepal said: “I was arrested walking home from the market because I don’t have a residency permit, even though I’ve tried to get one, as a legitimate asylum seeker. The police got so violent. I was beaten with sticks on my body and the soles of my feet and called a ‘Bhote Kukkur’ – Tibetan dog. I couldn’t walk out of the jail when they released me, I had to crawl and they kicked me and laughed.”

Tibetans have virtually no freedom of movement in Kathmandu, from all quarters. In addition to the sharp increase in police aggression is a spike in gang violence directed at Tibetans, which many believe is financed by Chinese agents. Said a Tibetan exile textile merchant in Thamel, Kathmandu’s tourist hub; “If we go out at night, gangs can stop our cars, take all of our money and jewelry, they also try to assault women, but we cannot report this to the police because they are doing it too.”

Legal Status and Documentation

In 1998, the Nepali government stopped issuing Refugee Cards (RCs) to Tibetans born in Nepal after 1989. This third young generation of Tibetans in Nepal are today undocumented persons, they cannot obtain any valid identification papers, residency permits or travel documents, even official Nepali birth certificates are now deemed invalid.

A young Tibetan from Pokhara obtained a medical degree in Kathmandu and hoped to become a doctor, but was not permitted to practice medicine in Nepal, his birthplace, because of his ethnicity and refugee status. In 2011, Chinese agents coerced the manager of a Nabil Bank in Pokhara into firing a Tibetan woman employed by the bank for 7 years. Said a 25 year old Tibetan from Pokhara; “When you apply for a job, the first questions they ask is, are you Tibetan? Then don’t come in here.”

It is the poorest Tibetans living in the old, decaying camp system who are most emotionally affected by the crisis in Tibet, and most likely to participate in political demonstrations, which now incurs great risks.

On Nov 2nd 2011 Sonam Choedon, a Tibetan woman in Jawalakhel, doused herself in kerosene and attempted self immolation.  She was restrained by police and taken to a clinic for burn injuries.  On Nov 3rd, Sherab Tsedor, a 25-year-old Tibetan refugee living in India, set himself on fire, in front of the Chinese Embassy in the Indian capital of New Delhi.

In response to these self-immolation attempts in exile, the Nepali Ministry of Home Affairs stated that the government will soon review its policies on the Tibetan refugees that are likely to be more stringent, reports confirm. Sudhir Kumar Sah of the Home spoke to the press on November 13, 2011: “The government is in a very difficult situation since the Tibetans have begun setting themselves on fire. The government of Nepal is committed on its one China policy. We will not allow any activities that go against the interest of our neighbors. This will lead to a situation where the government may have to slash all the facilities being granted to the Tibetans residing in Nepal, such as that of their freedom to move even.”

A Tibetan journalist who was born in Jawalakhel, the oldest Tibetan camp in Kathmandu, says: “We feel like we are under house arrest. We are monitored when we come and go from our homes. Our phones are tapped. We know that Chinese pressure is working, because our entire network is being pulled apart. We don’t have a safe place to hold meetings anymore, like we used to. So we’re not able to make plans for how to respond to this change in Nepal’s policy towards Tibetans.”

Escape and Refoulement

The Tibetan refugee passage is the longest and most dangerous escape route on earth: travelling on foot cross the Himalayas. Refugees who survived the ascent from Mount Everest and eluded Chinese patrols at the Nepal border were formerly rescued by UN protection officers, but for years UNHCR has not been granted permission to operate at the border.

With the loss of international monitoring at the border, documenting cases of refoulement is extremely difficult. A young refugee named Tashi entered Nepal in mid-September 2011 with a group of five other Tibetans from his village of around the same age. The six young men each paid a guide 6000 yuan (approximately US $943) to travel from Lhasa to the Nepal border. When the group reached Nepal in mid-September, Tashi was separated from the group and the International Campaign for Tibet verified his refoulement three months after it occurred.

A group of 23 Tibetans in the border area was also detained at the same time, many of them children under the age of 10. They were taken into custody of Nepal’s Department of Immigration in Kathmandu for 12 days before being handed over to the UNHCR, despite pressure from the Chinese embassy to remand the refugees to border police.
Two U.S. Congressmen, Steve Chabot and James Sensenbrenner, visited Kathmandu in late September and October and publicly stated the US support for the Tibetan refugees. On Nov. 4th, Rep. Frank Wolf (R-VA) of the US House Appropriations Committee said he would try to block funding to Nepal unless it grants exit visas to Tibetans who seek refuge in the United States. (In 2010 USAID contributed $56 million in funds in Nepal).  On November 20, U.S. Ambassador Scott DeLisi’s article in the Kathmandu Post was published when Nepal’s Foreign Minister Narayan Kaji Shrestha visited Lhasa, Tibet, where he pledged to not allow any “anti-Chinese activities” on Nepali soil.

Pokhara

Today about 3,000 Tibetan refugees in the Pokhara camps.  The camp schools are clinics are funded by the Snow Lion Foundation and European NGO’s, but are cut off from the CTA based in Dharamshala.

Pokhara, once the exile headquarters of the Chushi Gandruk, is now a Chinese City. There used to be 150 Tibetan shops in the lakeside tourist district, but now there are only 12 left. Chinese businesses dominate the landscape; everywhere, hotels, restaurants, stores for Chinese tourists. In 2011, for the first time, Nepali soldiers, armed with guns and batons, stopped all celebrations of the Dalai Lama’s birthday in Pokhara. (The Dalai Lama’s birthday observances have been banned in Kathmandu since the 2008 Lhasa Uprising).
USAID is funding a project created by TechnoServe, in partnership with the SnowLion Foundation, to create organic farms in the Pokhara settlements. The mission statement reads: “The economic challenges faced by Tibetans living in exile in India, Nepal and Bhutan pose major constraints to sustaining settlement communities and supporting their aspirations. The Economic Development of Tibetan Settlements (EDOTS) program is a unique opportunity to create sustainable, replicable livelihood opportunities that will reduce out-migration. This will keep Tibetan communities together which will preserve Tibetan identity, cultural and linguistic traditions – a key objective of the Tibetan community in exile. EDOTS will demonstrate scalable models of improved organic farming and workforce development, which will result in a 10% increase in participating farmer production and revenues and 10% increase wages of people benefitting from the workforce development intervention.”

But a Tibetan community leader in Pokhara says; “We get the wrong kind of aid: we don’t need new houses. A house won’t benefit you if you have no legal papers, when it is impossible to find a job, or put your children into a school. The Dalai Lama did so much to educate Tibetan refugee children, so we have a generation of young people who want to enter Nepali society but now they can’t. We have been here for over 50 years. Our young people have no future. Re-settlement is the only option for us.”

Survival in the 21st Century

Tibetans have been stateless exiles for 53 years; second to the Palestinians as the world’s longest unresolved refugee crisis. The Dalai Lama is one of the world’s most respected individuals, the Tibetan cause generates sympathy, but it does not translate into material support for tens of thousands of refugees scattered across the Indian subcontinent in a fragile diaspora.

The options for the Tibetan refugees in Nepal are constrained when the state of governance is fragile after a lengthy and destructive civil war wherein 15,000 citizens were killed, thousands more tortured, traumatized, driven from their homes. Nepal enters the 21st century an impoverished state of 28 million people, struggling to form a republic from an absolute monarchy. Kathmandu is choked by a toxic merger of pollution, overpopulation, chronic shortages of water, electricity and petrol.

In 2011 the Maoist government expelled two UN agencies, UNMIN and OHCHR, before they had completed their mission to investigate wartime atrocities and bring perpetrators to justice.  The new constitution has yet to be drafted and ratified, thus the status of Tibetan and other refugees in Nepal remains unresolved and is likely to remain so for the foreseeable future.

Nepal, anchor of the Himalayan Belt, abode of Shiva and Buddha, the lone buffer state affixed between China and India, lurches towards an uncertain future, the age of kings eclipsed by the Communist Manifesto.  In the 15 years of the insurgency, the Maoists did not bring food, schoolbooks or medicine to the rural poor. They brought combat fatigues, rifles and grenades, the torture techniques of the Khmer Rouge and the revolutionary hysteria of the Red Guards. The Maoists now rule Kathmandu, giving the People’s Republic of China a foothold in South Asia.

China’s expanding influence in Nepal complicates relations with India. External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh recently spoke of the “China-Nepal nexus on the rise… there is a chilling in India-Nepal relations.”

In the Cold War period China was a feared and distant presence in the Himalayan Belt. India was, and still is, Nepal’s largest foreign aid donor and sole source of petrol and other essential commodities. A Treaty of Peace and Friendship, hastily enacted after India’s defeat in the 1962 war – allows Indian and Nepalese citizens to travel to each other’s countries without a passport or visa. Over 8 million Nepalis lives and work in India, yet in 2008 the Nepali Maoists have moved to revoke the terms of the treaty with India, while encouraging stronger ties with China. China was never a dominant presence in Nepal before the Jana Andolan movement in the early 1990’s. Now China’s influence in Nepal is ubiquitous; Chinese engineers are now expanding the “Friendship Highway” and developing projects along the Tibet-Nepal border.  Kathmandu is filled with new organizations promoting “China-Nepal Friendship”, with trade fairs, academic conferences, cultural shows and tourism.

Integration of Tibetan refugees in Nepal is increasingly untenable with the ascendancy of the Maoists and their close ties to Beijing.  Resettlement would alleviate pressure on the Nepali government and rescue Tibetan refugees from danger.  In 2006-7, the US government proposed re-settlement of up to 5,000 Tibetan refugees from Nepal, but the Maoist government refuses to issue exit permits for Tibetans.

In 2011 three US congressmen sent a letter to the Prime Minister Bhattarai on the status of the Tibetan refugees, which was duly noted. By raising the matter, the US government could open a new dialogue with Nepali officials about Tibetan residency papers, protection and re-settlement, which is in Nepal’s interest. The US has just re-settled 80,000 Bhutanese refugees from Nepal; can the US use this as leverage to re-settle a much smaller number of Tibetans refugees?

Nepal and Tibet have a long history than spans many centuries. In the past 53 years, Nepalis have granted generous sanctuary to Tibetan refugees, and there are still strong bonds of friendship between the Nepali and Tibetan people.  Let us hope that this friendship will not be yet another casualty of China’s Rise.  As the Tibet crisis festers and burns, the short term scenarios are bleak, but as a Tibetan lama in Kathmandu observed; “Nepalis are beginning to wonder why the Chinese demand control over their Tibetan neighbors, and many are asking, are we next?”

Jamphel Yeshi's funerals (photo: Tenzin Dorjee)

The string of self-immolations inside Tibet—started in 2009 by a Kirti Monastery monk Tapey and which most recently on March 30 claimed two monks in Barkham County—sees no sign of letting up. On the contrary, despite one of the harshest crackdowns the Chinese government has unleashed in response, the state paranoia more acute and the military repression more penetrating than during the clampdown on the 2008 uprisings, and despite the abysmal response forthcoming from the international community, there seems to be at work an incredible wind fanning across the occupied Buddhist country that is at once frightening and pregnant with hope.

While analysts and observers scramble to offer logical explanations for the horrific protests unfolding at an alarmingly accelerated rate, much of which regurgitate the obvious and overlook the vital, it is safe to say the self-immolations suggest three undeniable truths. One: the Tibetan freedom struggle is way past its snapping point. Two: the fiery protests are a natural embodiment of the movement’s radicalization that was a long time coming. And three: the Tibetans inside Tibet are the true drivers of the narrative of the Tibetan freedom struggle, not the ones in the diaspora, not even the exile leadership headed by democratically elect Dr. Lobsang Sangay. Just as with the hardened earth and the grassy patches and the dusty grounds and the concrete sidewalks onto which have collapsed the 33 self-immolators (32 of them since last year alone), embers rolling out from their bodies as though rosary beads, the landscape of the Tibetan freedom movement now stands irreparably scorched and irredeemably altered.

A recurring point of reference has been the Vietnamese monk Thich Quang Duc whose burning profile in meditation pose photographed in 1963 remains one of the most iconic images of self-immolation as a protest form.  The Vietnamese self-immolator was protesting against the then President Ngo Ding Dem’s Roman Catholic Administration for its religious persecution of the country’s Buddhist population. Thich Quang Duc and those who followed him were all from the monastic community. The same, to a great extent, is true with Tibetan self-immolators; majority of those who died on the spot and those who survived and were captured by Chinese authorities were monks or nuns. The parallel, however, stops here.

Dislocation of Context

Beyond that, any exaggerated location of religious impulse in the self-immolations is unwarranted. It both translates into fabrication as well as a disservice to the Tibetan martyrs. While some such distortions are ill articulated, others are downright manipulative. A case in point being an article titled “Man on Fire” (Himal, February 10, 2012) written by Bhuchung K. Tsering of International Campaign for Tibet, who termed the self-immolations as a precursor to a “Tibetan Buddhist Liberation Theology.”

The missionary-centric emphasis—inspired possibly by an internet-scouring binge involving the use of such key words as “Buddhism,” “Freedom,” “Liberation”—to support which the writer quotes an obscure Peruvian priest might have been left to content with its banality, had the overall article not been more damaging. A Vice President of the resource-rich Tibet advocacy group established to lobby support from the U.S. government, the position has lent itself into making him one of the foremost “Middle-Way” Approach propagandists. The diplomat’s utterances have typically centered on editing out Tibet’s political nationalism, the country’s independence aspirations being the target of his signature censorship. His writings, even on crises such as ones unfolding in Tibet, read like a brochure for a Buddhist spiritual utopia.

In his Himal piece, Bhuchung cautiously treads his truth-obfuscating maneuver. In between paragraphs, he devotes ample references to the word “political”. Only on a fuller reading do they reveal as being customary and serving a more dubious design: one of summoning disapproval upon any potential reading of pro-independence slant into the fiery protests. In perhaps the most spectacular narcissistic exercise in the history of Tibetan opinion writing, the writer concludes the article by quoting himself from another piece he wrote in 1998.

“Writing in the Tibetan Review at the time, this writer warned against reactions that unintentionally glorified death:” he writes before paraphrasing the following extract, “Thupten Ngodup’s action was the result of the courage of his conviction. Interpreting it in any other way so as to bolster a short-term political objective would not be doing justice to Thupten’s action. We should not take his action as a model……for other Tibetan freedom fighters to follow.”

The object of his umbrage is no doubt the Rangzen advocates, foremost among them Jamyang Norbu who had, shortly after the first exile self-immolation, written a studied piece on Pawo Thupten Ngodup, who was a dedicated member of the Tibetan Youth Congress, the oldest and most influential among Tibetan NGOs committed to restoring independence for Tibet; it was during the Delhi Police’s forcible interruption of an unto-death hunger strike organized by the activist group that the elderly Tibetan, in a blazing mass of flames, bolted to first exile martyrdom. These details Bhuchung conveniently sidesteps. As for the longer-term political objectives one is supposed to interpret from Pawo Ngodup’s action, one is offered little clue.

The Politics of Religion

In explaining the centrality of religion in the Tibetan nationalism vocabulary, Bhuchung not unfairly invokes the traditional usage of words such as “Tendra (Enemy of the Faith)” and Tensung Thanglang Maggar (Voluntary Force for the Defence of the Faith).” What is, again, left to suffer for casualty is the wider historical and etymological context that engendered such uniquely dichotomous and paradoxical native lexicon. In the olden Tibet, right up to the eve of the 1949 Chinese invasion, on account of the dominant role played by the three seats of Tibetan Buddhism and validated by the institution of the Dalai Lamas, Tibet’s religious identity was promoted at the exclusion of all national and political sovereignty-consolidating initiatives as we’ve come to appreciate in the modern terms. As Tsering Shakya says in his Dragon in the Land of Snows: A History of Modern Tibet since 1947, the final blow to Tibet’s efforts to garner international support came in the form of its non-existent international personality.

Furthermore, such simplistic reading as the writer employs discounts the complex role Tibetan monks have played on the national stage, both during factional infightings and in armed struggle against Communist Chinese aggressors. The trenchant rivalry in the 1940s between the Regent Redring and the incumbent Tagthra, who at various times fronted the Tibetan administration when the Dalai Lama was a minor, saw monks from the two establishments engage in fierce battles. As Melvyn Goldstein quoted a witness in his A History of Modern Tibet, 1913-1951: The Demise of the Lamaist State, as saying about the skirmishes, gunfire rang incessantly over the Lhasa city.”

Monks, and not just the Great Thirteenth Dalai Lama, played a pivotal role during the battles for Tibet’s independence in 1912-13 when the last of the Chinese soldiers were driven out of the country. Jamyang Norbu has written about the monk-Kalon Jampa Tendar who had disrobed and taken up a gun to lead the Tibetan army, and who had, upon Tibetan victory, to a demoralized group of surrendered Chinese soldiers, offered philosophical consolation along the lines of victory and defeat being two sides of the same coin, before packing them off along a safe route back home. One of the most unforgettable lines from “Shadow Circus, ” Tenzin Sonam and Ritu Sarin’s documentary on the CIA-backed guerrilla resistance in Tibet, belongs to a former monk-freedom fighter who describes the experience of killing Chinese soldiers: “Each time we pulled the trigger and a Chinese soldier fell, we said Om Mani Pedme Hung!”

To say that to those monks or former monks politics was secondary to religion would be a stretch. It was just that the language for political identity as defining an individual or a nation was not celebrated. In a vocabulary-rich civilization in which a mere title for a reincarnate lama could fill up pages, the term politics at best stood for administration, a system in which to support the flourishing of Buddhism. It warrants mentioning that in olden Tibet while flags and banners of every religious stripe were ubiquitous on rooftops of every monastery and select households, similar hoisting of the Tibetan national flag, outside the military exercises of the ragtag Tibetan army, became popular only after the Tibetans were forced into exile. This however cannot be construed to mean the Tibetans didn’t hold paramount their allegiance to the nation’s political sovereignty. Just as it cannot be argued that in their call for freedom for Tibet, or even return of His Holiness, the self-immolators were not staging a pointed political defiance to end the fifty-three years of China’s bloody occupation.

Rage and Rejection

However horrific or gruesome, self-immolation is, in essence, an act of conflating one’s body with space. In the case of self-immolators inside Tibet, if any religious connotation comes close, it seems to be the concept of Lu ski Chonme Phul wa (offering one’s body as flame)” in that by burning themselves these courageous protestors were shedding light on the sufferings of the larger Tibetan population under the boot heel of China’s tyrannical rule. Through turning themselves into human bonfire, they were projecting the most visible, the most visceral face to tens of thousands of others who, following more traditional forms of resistance (protests, pamphleteering, posters-circulating et all) are inevitably arrested, imprisoned and tortured, their subsequent fate unanimously sealed between deaths in prisons or release, after many years, back into the society as empty, broken shells.

Self-immolation, on the other hand, grants the protestor greater control over his body and a precious finality to his expression of resistance. One burns, one dies, refusing his tormentors any claim over his body. It bequeaths the protestor an unequivocal rejection of the oppressor state: the Communist Chinese government. Instead of languishing in another construct of colonialism such as a lock-up or a prison, one collapses and returns to the uncorrupted land of his birthright. His body on fire is his slogan, as are his vocal utterances for freedom for Tibet and return of His Holiness, which once released the expectation is that there will be no revocation, of the kind normally extracted by Chinese soldiers from traditional protestors through intense torture.

More than any ulterior Buddhist motives, the self-immolators seem driven by pure anger at the Chinese government, and not just for its unrelenting religious persecutions, most recently through the state-enforced patriotic re-education campaign instituted in 1994, which makes it mandatory for a monk or a nun to, among other avowals, pledge allegiance to the Communist Chinese government, denounce the Dalai Lama as a counter-revolutionary and a separatist, and accept the Chinese -appointed Gyaltsen Norbu as the 11th Panchen Lama over the candidate chosen by the Dalai Lama; Gedun Choekyi Nyima was abducted, at age six, in 1995 and his whereabouts have since remained unknown. To the monks, perennially exposed to arrests and expulsion, torture and deaths, for simply wanting to practice Buddhism in its true form, China’s oppressive policies toward their religion are recognizable for their singular message: Buddhism and Communist China simply cannot co-exist.

Conversely, this realization lays bare the contradiction inherent in the Middle Way Approach, which hopes for a scenario in which Communist China would allow for Tibet cultural autonomy as a reward for giving up its independence. It doesn’t seem impossible, hence, that the self-immolations are also a direct response to the failure of the Middle Way Approach Policy, which frames dialogue with China an end in itself, as opposed to being a means to an end. If this passive strategy required its proponents to wait and bide its time, the self-immolators have demonstrated it to be an unviable option.

In a note left behind by one of the early monk-self immolators, he had written: “Let alone living under the Communist China for one more day, I can not even live for one more minute.”

The Unspoken Communication

The acceleration of self-immolations became noticeable a week after Dr. Lobsang Sangay assumed office of the exile Tibetan government’s prime minister in April 2011, following the Dalai Lama’s announcement of complete retirement from the political scene. The first self-immolation in Tibet had taken place in February 2009 when a young Kirti Monastery monk Tapey had set himself on fire; Chinese soldiers shot at him and took him away. A second one, involving Phuntsog from the same monastery, occurred two years later, full five months before the historic shift in exile polity. At the swearing-in ceremony, the new Kalon Tripa intoned, “Let me be clear: the Tibetan Administration does not encourage protest (in Tibet) in part because we cannot forget the harsh response Chinese authorities hand down in the face of free and peaceful expression.” Within a week, a third self-immolation was reported from inside Tibet.

Since then, on an average, three to four such protests every month have taken place in Tibet, mostly concentrated in erstwhile Kham and Amdo provinces. The fiery self-sacrifices have prompted massive gatherings, which have, on at least two occasions, erupted in open revolt; in January, Chinese soldiers shot into two protests, killing at least ten protestors.

When Lobsang Sangay, in his speech, reminded the exile Tibetan gathering that it was not to him alone the Dalai Lama had devolved his power, it might have been the self-immolators who had taken to heart his concluding refrain: “Let us never forget: during our lifetime, our freedom struggle will meet the fate of justice or defeat. Tibet will either appear or disappear from the map of the world.”

This synchronicity of events is not accidental. An invisible communication line connects the Tibetans inside Tibet and their exile counterparts. The dialogue is unspoken and it is cryptic. No instructions, no orders, no appeals are involved. Over the Himalayan divide at least, no overt call to action is made. Given this scenario, China’s allegation of the Dalai Lama and the exile Tibetan government being behind the self-immolations is absurd. During the 2008 uprisings in Tibet, when hundreds of Tibetans were killed or were reported missing, the best advice the exile leadership had for the remaining others who risked similar fate was to exercise “restraint.” Still, a slight movement in Dharamsala continues to affect events inside the Chinese-occupied region, just as it does in the opposite direction.

The 1987 through 1989 uprisings serve a good example. The revolts, which began with a protest on September 27 outside the Jokhang Cathedral in Lhasa, had their roots in a more somber event halfway across the world: the Dalai Lama’s address to the U.S Congressional Human Rights Caucus. The Tibetan leader had never before been accorded such a high-level platform which opportunity he used to introduce his Five Point Peace Plan, the last of which items, “Negotiations on the future status of Tibet and the relationship between the Tibetan and Chinese peoples should be started in earnest,” was the first hint at what would later become his Middle Way Approach Policy.

As Jampa Tsering, one of the first monk-protestors from the nearby Ganden Monastery, later told me for a story I was writing for Tibetan Bulletin, “We knew the risks were enormous, but we had to do something. We felt staying silent would be construed to mean we agreed with China’s defamation of His Holiness the Dalai Lama.” The exiled Tibetan leader’s recent global spotlight had irked Beijing and its propaganda had stepped up its denunciation campaigns, accusing the Dalai Lama of colluding with “Western Imperialists” to carry out their “splittist” designs on Tibet. And so, on a frosty September morning, Jampa and his fellow monk-protestors took three rounds of the famous shrine, then took out their hand-drawn Tibetan flags and shouted slogans demanding independence for Tibet. Within minutes Chinese soldiers showed up, beat up the protestors and drove them away. But the façade of calm that had reigned for less than last three decades had cracked. This unprecedented defiance sparked off a series of open revolts and thanks to images smuggled out by western tourists Tibet was yet again in newspaper headlines.

If Beijing’s ravenous defamation of the Dalai Lama’s “internationalizing” of Tibet had prompted the Lhasa protests, the events garnered for the Tibetan leader in 1988 another important audience: members of European Parliament in Strasbourg, France. Known as Strasbourg Proposal, the new policy His Holiness outlined was an expansion of the fifth point from the previous year. Independence for Tibet, which the Tibetan leader had repeatedly referred to on both occasions, was officially eschewed as a goal of the Tibetan struggle. In its place the three provinces of Tibet were to become an autonomous entity under the Beijing leadership’s political sovereignty. Meanwhile, inside Tibet the revolt continued. A year later in 1989, as Tibet reeled under martial law, the Dalai Lama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

The 2008 uprisings that shocked the world had begun with a procession by some 300 monks from Drepung Monastery to Lhasa’s city center. The monks’ main demand was the release of Drepung monks who had been detained in October of the previous year for whitewashing a wall in celebration of the conferment of the Congressional Gold Medal to the Dalai Lama. The protest kicked off a wave of uprisings that spread across the entire Tibetan plateau, with an unprecedented participation by not only monks and nuns, but laypeople of all ages and backgrounds; the Chinese paramilitary crackdown that followed spawned the bloodiest reprisals the country had seen since the 1980’s uprisings.

The exile Free Tibet movement responded in kind. Activists across the world successfully stripped the Chinese Olympics Torch Relay of its perceived glory and turned Beijing’s bid for international legitimacy into a magnet for epic shame. A renewed vigor was injected into Tibet’s struggle for freedom; a new sense of hope prevailed. Hundreds of exiles and supporters embarked on a walk to Tibet and when the Indian police forcibly stopped the return march, just outside Tibet’s border with India, their collective spirit had already set foot on the Tibetan soil. In India, in Nepal and elsewhere in the world, activists from Tibetan Youth Congress, Students for a Free Tibet, Tibetan Women’s Association, and other organizations, forged an unbroken link of protests and other campaigns, including hunger strikes, which pulled any illusion of respite over its occupation of Tibet from under Beijing’s feet.

While the exile administration had seemed to make waiting for Beijing to talk its end game, the Free Tibet activists had brought the fight to China’s door. Media attention was minimal, so was the international diplomatic show of support, but Beijing knew, as clearly did the exile activists, that the real author driving the narrative for Tibet’s freedom struggle lied inside Tibet. As if on cue from the voices from behind the Himalayas, the only autonomy being realized, across the diaspora, was a certain decentralization of the Tibet movement. While Tibetans’ spiritual allegiance to His Holiness remained unwavering, every second Tibetan on social network sites such as Facebook had a new middle name: “Rangzen (independence).”

The Birth of Second Exile Martyr

Against this background, the self-immolation in Delhi of the 27-year-old martyr Jamphel Yeshi assumes immeasurable importance. The recent escapee from Tibet, by all accounts an unassuming youth with a devout bend of mind and an indefatigable appetite for Tibetan history, bolted across the Jantar Mantar ground, during a Tibetan protest ahead of Chinese President Hu Jintao’s visit, in a raging cloud of fire. If, on account of the media blackout in Tibet, the 30-odd self-immolators’ sacrifices communicated only through a few grainy and obscure images, martyr Jamphel Yeshi’s searing figure more than filled up the naked eye of the camera.

Just as the self-immolators inside Tibet had projected a visceral front to the tens of thousands of other traditional protestors whose actions, as well as their fate, had been rendered invisible by China’s strong arm, martyr Jamphel Yeshi, in one single stroke, amplified the new radicalization of the Tibetan freedom struggle. The Tibet self-immolations had been given an intimate face. By the time he succumbed to his burns two days later, his blazing profile was captured by the major national and international medias. The massive 2008 uprisings made it to the cover of the New York Times only once; the featured image was that of Chinese soldiers behind plastic shields. When martyr Jamphel Yeshi reclaimed the honor, the image was that of a man on fire, as befitting the country he stood for.

It is no accident that the site for the fiery exile protest was the same ground on which the first Tibetan self-immolation had taken place. It would not amount to mere conjecture if one were to assume that Tapey, the Kirti monk, had been inspired by Pawo Thupten Ngodup, whose self-immolation in 1998 shook the Tibetan world. While comparisons have been drawn to the Tunisian fruit vendor, Mohamed Bouazizi, whose self-immolation had unleashed the Arab Spring, it is more likely that the inspiration for the self-immolators in Tibet had been of the indigenous kind.

Martyr Jamphel Yeshi only helped draw the circle full.

16 March 2012

1

Long Live His Holiness the Dalai Lama, who is the shining example of world peace. We must strive to ensure return of His Holiness to Tibet. I pray and believe that the Tibetan people in and outside Tibet will be united and sing the Tibetan national anthem in front of the Potala Palace.

2

My fellow Tibetans, when we think about our future happiness and path, we need loyalty. It is the life-soul of a people. It is the spirit to find truth. It is the guide leading to happiness. My fellow Tibetans, if you want equality and happiness as the rest of the world, you must hold onto this word ‘LOYALTY’ towards your country. Loyalty is the wisdom to know truth from falsehood. You must work hard in all your endeavours, big or small.

3

Freedom is the basis of happiness for all living beings. Without freedom, six million Tibetans are like a butter lamp in the wind, without direction. My fellow Tibetans from Three Provinces, it is clear to us all that if we unitedly put our strength together, there will be result. So, don’t be disheartened.

4

What I want to convey here is the concern of the six million Tibetans. At a time when we are making our final move toward our goal – if you have money, it is the time to spend it; if you are educated it is the time to produce results; if you have control over your life, I think the day has come to sacrifice your life. The fact that Tibetan people are setting themselves on fire in this 21st century is to let the world know about their suffering, and to tell the world about the denial of basic human rights. If you have any empathy, stand up for the Tibetan people.

5

We demand freedom to practice our religion and culture. We demand freedom to use our language. We demand the same right as other people living elsewhere in the world. People of the world, stand up for Tibet. Tibet belongs to Tibetans. Victory to Tibet!

signed: Tawu Jampel Yeshi

Are my grasslands still green?
Are my blue lakes still crystal clear?
Do my hills and streams still sing their melodious songs?
Great gods of Tibet,
Do you still see them in your vision?

Can all the bloody crimes of the world
Be burned and transformed by the heat of fire;

Who is sucking the blood and marrow from my body?
Who is erasing the bloody images on my chest?
Who dug up and desecrated my father’s grave?
Before my very eyes.
Who cut the life force from my mother’s tongue
How can I accept and tolerate all this?

This body of flesh cannot be lifted by the mind
This pain of the wounded heart cannot be endured anymore

Yesterday, the ancestral land of my dream destroyed by an army of bandits
Today, my precious mother made shamefully naked before my eyes
Tomorrow, my children’s brains and bones savagely scattered about
I cannot submit to this anymore

This inner conviction formed by my discrimination;
This path of life that discovered in my dream;
I wish to burn, thus, without regret.
This magnificent light, like a butter lamp, is ignited by the mind
This whole body, like an “Offering Bowl” desires to be sacrificed without remorse.

Brothers and sisters, old and young, who will live forever in my heart
Gods and Goddess illuminated by the conviction of my love and faith
Also the splendor of the immovable mountains and enduring rivers in my heart
All of you rise higher through my consciousness
All of you live longer through my aspirations

From now on, aim the bullets of the many thousand guns only at me
Inflict all the most painful beatings and tortures only on me
Furthermore, direct all your persecution and tyranny only on me
I offer you the full measure of my life forever
And I assume full responsibility for this commitment

From today, please treasure the custom and heritage of my lineage
Take care the of the purity of my land and environment
Respect the life force of my mother tongue
Give freedom to all my humble brothers and sisters

This Is my last testament written with my blood
Because of necessity it is my goal to burn myself forever
So let me accomplish this!
All the ability and power of the divine dwells in love and faith
All the discriminations of humans live in sorrow and happiness
Show your solidarity to my past
Be witness to my present, before my eyes.
Show concern tomorrow for the welfare of my family.

I am walking thus on the path of light, to becoming the living proof of truth
I am sacrificing myself thus on the face of actuality.

All my brothers and sisters, young and old, living in misery and sorrow
All people throughout the world who love freedom and peace
And to you tyrants of violence, oppression and torture.
What I want is lasting peace and freedom
What I am searching for is an existence of equality and caring
Until I accomplish this
I will burn myself again and again.

བདག་གི་རྩྭ་ཐང་ད་དུང་ལྗང་མདོག་ཡིན་ནམ།
བདག་གི་མཚོ་མོ་ད་དུང་དྭངས་གཙང་ཡིན་ནམ།
བདག་གི་རི་ཆུར་ད་དུང་དབྱངས་རྟ་ཡོད་དམ།
ལྷ་ཆེན་གྱི་སྤྱན་ཟུང་ཡ།
ཁྱེད་ཀྱིས་གཟིགས་ཨེ་བྱུང་།

འཇིག་རྟེན་སྟེང་གི་ཁྲག་གི་འགུལ་སྐྱོད་ཡོད་ཚད།
འདི་ལྟར་ཚ་དྲོད་ཀྱིས་འབར་ཞིང་ཚ་དྲོད་ཀྱི་སྒུལ་ནུས་ན།
བདག་གི་རུས་རྐང་གི་ཟུངས་ཁྲག་འདི་སུ་ཡིས་འཇིབ་ཀྱིན་འདུག
བདག་གི་བྲང་གཞུང་གི་ཁྲག་རིས་དེ་སུ་ཡིས་གསུབ་ཀྱིན་འདུག

མིག་གིས་མཐོང་ས་ནས།
ཡབ་མེས་ཀྱི་དུར་ས་སུ་ཡིས་སྔོག་སོང་།
རྣ་བས་ཐོས་ས་ནས
ཡུམ་སྐད་ཀྱི་བླ་སྲོག་སུ་ཡིས་བཅད་སོང་།
བདག་གིས་ཇི་ལྟར་བཟོད་དམ།

ཤ་གཟུགས་ཀྱི་ལུས་པོ་འདི་སེམས་ཀྱིས་ཐེག་གྱིན་མི་འདུག
ན་ཟུག་གི་རྨ་ཁ་འདི་ཚོར་བས་ཁྱོག་གྱིན་མི་འདུག
ངོ་མ་ང་ལ་འདི་ལྟར་གནར་གཅོད་གཏོང་དོན་ཅི།

ཁ་སང་། རྨི་ལམ་ཁྲོད་བདག་གི་ཕ་གཞིས་ཇག་དམག་གི་གཏོར་སོང་།
དེ་རིང་། མཐོང་སྣང་ནས་བདག་གི་མ་ཡུམ་གཅེར་བུར་ཕུད་སོང་།
སང་ཉིན། མངོན་སུམ་འཛེམས་མེད་ཀྱིས།
བདག་གི་བུ་ཕྲུག་གི་ཀླད་རུས་དབྱིངས་སུ་གཏོར་ངེས་པས།
བདག་གིས་དངོས་ནས་བཟོད་ཀྱིན་མི་འདུག

བདག་གི་འདུ་ཤེས་ལས་གྲུབ་པའི་ནང་སེམས་ཀྱི་ཚོར་བ་འདི།
བདག་གི་རྨི་ལམ་ལས་རྙེད་པའི་མི་ཚེའི་ལམ་བུ་འདི།
འདི་ལྟར་ཕངས་མེད་དུ་འབར་འདོད།
མར་མེ་ལྟ་བུའི་རླབས་ཆེན་གྱི་འོད་སྣང་ཞིག་སེམས་ཀྱིས་སྦར་ཏེ།
རང་ལུས་རྐོང་བུ་གང་བོ་འདི་ལྟར་ཕངས་མེད་དུ་སྒྲོན་འདོད།

ངའི་སེམས་ཁོང་ནས་གཏན་དུ་ཡལ་མི་སྲིད་པའི་ཕུ་ནུ་མིང་སྲིང་ཚོ།
ངའི་དད་འདུན་ཁྲོད་ཡིད་ཆེས་ཀྱིས་འབར་བའི་ལྷ་དང་ལྷ་མོའི་ཚོགས།
ད་དུང་ངའི་སྙིང་དབུས་ན་བརྟན་བརླིང་གིས་འགྱིང་བའི་རི་ཆུའི་རྔམ་བརྗིད་ཡ།
ཡོད་ཚད་བདག་གི་རྣམ་ཤེས་ཀྱིས་མཐོ་རུ་འདེགས་བཞིན་བུད་འགྲོ
ཡོད་ཚད་བདག་གིས་འདུན་པ་ཡིས་རིང་བོར་བསྲིངས་བཞིན་བུད་འགྲོ

ད་ནས་བཟུང་། མེ་མདའ་ཁྲི་ཕྲག་གི་མདེའུ་ཆར་རྣོན་པོ་ང་ཁོ་ནར་གཏོད་རོགས།
གནར་གཅོད་ཚད་མེད་ཀྱི་རྡུང་རྡེག་ཡོད་ཚད་ང་ཁོ་ནར་གཏོང་རོགས།
ད་དུང་བཙན་དབང་དང་བཀའ་བརྒྱ་ཡོད་ཚད་ང་ཁོ་ནར་འཇོག་རོགས།
རྒྱུ་མཚན།
བདག་གིས་རང་ཉིད་ལ་མངའ་བའི་ཚེ་སྲོག་གི་རིན་ཐང་དུས་གཏན་དུ་ཁྱེད་ལ་ཕུལ་ཡོད།
བདག་གིས་རང་ཉིད་ཀྱིས་བསྒྲུབས་ནུས་པའི་འོས་འགན་ཞིག་ཁྱེད་ལ་མཐོ་རུ་བཏེགས་ཡོད།

ད་ནས་བཟུང་། ངའི་རིགས་བརྒྱུད་ཀྱི་ལྗང་མདོགས་ལ་གཅེས་སྤྲས་གནང་རོགས།
ངའི་དྭངས་གཙང་གི་ཁོར་ཡུག་ལ་བདག་ཉར་བགྱིས་རོགས།
ངའི་ཡུམ་སྐད་ཀྱི་བླ་སྲོག་ལ་མཐོང་ཆེན་གནང་རོགས།
ད་དུང་ངའི་གཉོམ་དུང་དུང་གི་སྤུན་ཟླ་ཡོད་ཚད་ལ་རང་དབང་སྤྲོད་རོགས།

འདི་ནི་ངའི་ཁྲག་གིས་བྲིས་པའི་ཁ་ཆེམས་ཀྱི་ཡིག་འབྲུ་ཡིན།
འདི་ནི་ང་རང་གཏན་དུ་འབར་དགོས་པའི་དགོས་དབང་དང་དམིགས་འདུན་ཡིན་པས།
ཅིས་ཀྱང་བསྒྲིབས་རོགས་ཀྱེ།
དད་འདུན་གྱི་ཀློང་ན་བཞུགས་པའི་ལྷ་དབང་གི་ནུས་མཐུ་ཡོད་ཚད་ཡ།
བདེ་སྡུག་གི་ཡུལ་ན་འཚོ་བའི་མིའི་རིགས་ཀྱི་འདུ་ཤེས་ཡོད་ཚད་ཡ།
བདག་གི་ཁ་སང་གི་འདས་དོན་ལ་གདུང་སེམས་བསྐྱེད་དང་།
བདག་གི་དེ་རིང་གི་ངོ་གདོང་ལ་བདེན་དཔང་གནོངས་དང་།
བདག་གི་སང་ཉིན་གྱི་ཁྱིམ་གཞིས་ལ་ཐུགས་ཁུར་བཞེས་དང་།

ང་རང་འདི་ལྟར་འོད་ཀྱི་ལམ་བུ་ནས་བདེན་དབང་གི་བགྲོད་བཞིན་ཡོད།
ང་རང་འདི་ལྟར་དོན་དངོས་ཀྱི་ངོ་གདོང་ན་སྐྱོ་ངལ་གྱིས་འབར་བཞིན་ཡོད།

ངུ་ངག་དང་གྱེས་གདུང་གིས་འཚོ་བའི་ཕུ་ནུ་མིང་སྲིང་ཚོ།
རང་དབང་དང་ཞི་བདེར་ཞོགས་པའི་འཛམ་གླིང་མི་མང་ཚོ།
ད་དུང་གཉའ་གནོན་དང་རྡུང་རྡེག་ལ་གོམས་པའི་དྲག་པོའི་སྲིད་གཞུང་ཡ།
བདག་ལ་དགོས་པ་དུས་གཏན་གྱི་ཞི་བདེ་དང་དགའ་འབོད་ཡིན།
བདག་གིས་འཚོལ་བ་འདྲ་མཉམ་དང་དོ་ཁུར་གྱི་འཚོ་གནས་ཡིན།
དགོས་འདུན་འདི་མ་ཚིམ་བར་དུ།
ང་འདི་ལྟར་ཡང་ཡང་འབར་ན་འདོད།
༢༠༡༢ལོའི་ཟླ་༢པའི་ཚེས་༢ཉིན།