Gunshots at monastery, monks arrested:sources

Monks of Derge monastery in Derge initiated a vigorous protest Tuesday night in its campus, sources told Voice of Tibet radio service.

5 or 6 monks have been reportedly arrested.

Gunshots were heard in the vicinities of the Monastery but it is unclear whether anyone has been killed or wounded.

In the run up to Tibetan New year, a massive deployment of Chinese armed forces is reported in various Tibetan cities and towns.

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Tibetans urged to cancel New Year festivities over latest Chinese crackdown

Ethnic Tibetans are being urged not to celebrate the Chinese New Year, in protest at a renewed crackdown by Chinese officials in the regional capital, Lhasa.

In the past 11 days, 81 people have been detained and nearly 6,000 have been called in for questioning by police. Now, in a campaign spearheaded by the Tibetan Youth Congress labelling 2009 "a black year", Tibetans have been encouraged not to take part in next month's Lunar New Year festivities.

"The TYC calls upon China to end the illegal occupation of Tibet and to immediately release all Tibetan political prisoners currently languishing in Chinese gulags," said Tsewang Rigzin, spokesman for the Tibetan Youth Congress, at a press conference.

The Tibetan New Year starts with the new moon in late February, exactly one month after the start of the Chinese New Year of the Ox, which began on Monday.But the date has been picked by the Tibetan Youth Congress as a timely moment to protest continued Chinese rule over the province.

"As the year 2009 also marks 60 years since China's invasion and 50 years since China's occupation of Tibet, TYC delcares the year of 2009 as a black year and shall organise campaigns."

Australia Network's Ian Burrow's reports that the campaigns has already begun, with a series of hunger strikes and the burning of effigies of Chinese leaders in the streets of Lhasa.The Tibetan government in exile has also appealed to the international community to intervene in the latest Chinese crackdown.

Germany urges talks

The call came as Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao made his first visit to Europe since cancelling a visit to the region late last year, in anger at meetings between the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, and French President Nicolas Sarkozy.

Mr Wen was urged during a meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkl in Berlin to hold talks with the Dalai Lama."From the German side, I once again underlined that we have an intense interest in the talks with the representatives of the Dalai Lama gaining momentum again," Ms Merkl told reporters after the meeting on Thursday."And I offered our help, if Germany can make a constructive contribution, we are ready to do so."

In

http://www.radioaustralianews.net.au/stories/200901/2478086.htm?desktop

China detains 81 people in Tibet crackdown: media

At least 81 people in Tibet have been detained for suspected criminal activity amid a security sweep in the Himalayan region, including two who are being held for having "reactionary music" on their mobile phones, state media reported.

Tibet independence advocates said Wednesday the anti-crime crackdown appeared to be aimed at intimidating Tibetans ahead of sensitive anniversaries in coming weeks, including the 50th anniversary of a crushed independence uprising.

China has been preparing for the possibility of more unrest in Tibet since deadly rioting in the capital Lhasa on March 14 last year sparked the biggest anti-government protests among Tibetans in decades — and a major military crackdown.

The public security bureau of Lhasa, the region's capital, launched a "strike hard" campaign against crime on Jan. 18, with raids on numerous residential areas, rented rooms, hotels, guesthouses, Internet cafes and bars, the Tibetan Daily said in a report on the China Tibet News.

By Saturday, authorities had detained 51 people for unspecified criminal activities and taken in another 30 people for robbery, prostitution, theft, according to the report dated Sunday.

Two people were being held because "reactionary music" was found in their cell phones, the report said.

A woman who answered the phone at the Lhasa public security bureau hung up after saying the office was not authorized to speak with the media. Calls to the Lhasa government office rang unanswered Wednesday amid a weeklong national holiday to celebrate the Lunar New Year.

The International Campaign for Tibet said the latest "strike hard" campaign "appears to be intended to intimidate Tibetans still further" ahead of the Tibetan New Year in late February and the period in March that marks the 1959 independence uprising and the Dalai Lama's flight to India.

The 'strike hard' campaigns are crime crackdowns in which normal arrest and prosecution procedures are usually waived to maximize the numbers detained. Though they normally focus on criminals, in places like Tibet and the restive northwest region of Xinjiang, people suspected of anti-government activities are also targeted.

In December, Chinese state media reported that authorities in Tibet detained 59 people accused of disseminating rumors aimed at inciting ethnic tension and were cracking down on illegal downloads of "reactionary music" online.

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"Last year was washed by blood,

In Lhasa, countless compatriots

Were fallen under a piercing arrow,

This year, no Losar for us,

In Sichuan, countless people

Buried under the earth,

This year, no Losar for us,
There is only the word 'no' on your lips.

We are speechless,

You are filled with anger

We have no bitterness
For the sake of the deceased valiant heroes

Let us offer our regrets.

For the deceased people,

Let us make offerings."

Cha medsha

blogger

ICT Report

Some reports stated that local authorities had ordered that Tibetan New Year celebrations should be brought forward by one month to coincide with Chinese New Year.

A blog by one Tibetan on a Tibetan website reported that the county government had told Kirti monastery in Ngaba (Chinese: Aba) in Sichuan province to change the dates of new year and winter religious ceremonies to coincide with the Chinese NewYear.

This year, the two new years are a month apart , although in some parts of the Tibetan area of Amdo, the New Year has been celebrated according to the Chinese calendar. Security was stepped upon the streets near Kirti, where at least 10 Tibetans were shot dead during a protest last March.

One source told ICT: "Local people [inNgaba] are not celebrating [the New Year]. Tibetan women are in the streets, with solemn faces, showing sadness rather than happiness, and to symbolize the non-celebratory mood they carry around dry bread and eat that."

An anonymous Tibetan blogger posted the following comment on a Chinese-language, Tibetan-run website on January 25:

"The 2009 Losar was always going to be unusual because so many people have been killed. In our family, our father can never come back, our mother has visibly aged, uncles and brothers have been detained - some of whom we still don't whether they're dead or alive. Last night, the eldest brother in the neighbor's family was taken away. There's a guy from a village nearby who used to roam all over the place doing business who was locked up for a few months and recently released. But his body is so fragile now that he has to stay in bed with his wife and children looking after him. When you go out, although the police on the streetsaren't as evident as they were a few months ago, there are still a lot. There are armed PAP [People's Armed Police] guys on the roofs'maintaining social stability'. Leaders on television are going roundpaying their respects and urging people to have a good year... I myself will not be celebrating the new year because those who died were my compatriots, and I knew several of those who died - they were shot dead. I haven't dared call home since March of last year because I don't want to cause them any trouble. And so I don't know how they are. I've had no information on them, and just hope they're okay."

CTC releases documents from Canada’s Tibet file

The Canada Tibet Committee today released sixty-eight pages of declassified federal government documents, including a 1950 legal opinion from the Department of External Affairs that concluded from the point of view of international law, Tibet qualified for recognition as an independent state at the time Chinese forces invaded the country.

“No matter how zealously the Chinese government tries to rewrite history, fifty years after the 1959 Tibetan Uprising, history will not be erased,” said CTC Executive Director Dermod Travis. “It is the height of absurdity that the Chinese government has chosen to celebrate their military invasion as ‘Serf Emancipation Day’ when Canadian government reports and memoranda lay waste to any claim that China was liberating the Tibetan people when they invaded Tibet.”

In a November 1950 memorandum to Ottawa, Canada’s High Commissioner to India, Warwick Chipman, noted: “…if China owned Tibet…there would certainly be no point in sending an army to conquer it. The sending of an army is surely a confession that the matter is not domestic.” Five days later, Canada’s External Affairs department was circulating a legal opinion on the international status of Tibet.

The opinion contained in a 1950 memorandum stated: “The question is, should Canada consider Tibet to be an independent state, a vassal of China, or an integral portion of China. It is submitted that the Chinese claim to sovereignty over Tibet is not well founded. Chinese suzerainty, perhaps existent, though ill-defined, before 1911, appears since then, on the basis of facts available to us, to have been a mere fiction.

In fact, it appears that during the past 40 years Tibet has controlled its own internal and external affairs. Viewing the situation thus, I am of the opinion that Tibet is, from the point of view of international law, qualified for recognition as an independent state.” “Tibetan history will not be erased,” Travis said. “Despite the ‘Patriotic Education’ campaigns forced upon Tibetans by the Chinese government to this day, the Tibetan people will continue to resist any attempt to extinguish their history, their culture, and their spirit.”

As the Canadian Legation, Chungking, China advised Ottawa in 1944: “…there is no doubt that official China is determined to ‘swallow’ Sinkiang, Tibet, Outer Mongolia, Kansu and Sikang, no matter what the people living in those regions may feel about the matter.” The Legation added: “The Chinese do not see that the attempt to compel the Tibetans to allow themselves and their country to be incorporated as an integral part of China is most definitely an act of aggression.”

The documents prepared between 1944 and 1969, posted at the CTC website (www.tibet.ca), include memorandums updating the Canadian government on Chinese military aggression in the area, a 1950 National Defence document “The Strategic Importance of Tibet”, and a 1961 letter from His Holiness the Dalai Lama to Prime Minister John Diefenbaker.

The Canada Tibet Committee is an independent non-governmental organisation of Tibetans and non-Tibetans living in Canada, who are concerned about the continuing human rights violations and lack of democratic freedom in Tibet.

No New Year movement gains momentum

As the Tibetans all over the world plan to skip celebrations of the Tibetan New Year 2136, the act of passive resistance is gaining momentum everywhere including Dharamsala, the exile headquarters of the Tibetan government.

Four NGO’s of the Tibetan community vowed to observe the Tibetan New Year with prayer vigils and minus any festivities to mourn the slaying of over two hundred Tibetans by Chinese forces in the aftermath of March uprising in Tibet last year, and to protest China's ongoing crackdown.

The Tibetan Women's Association, Gu-Chu-Sum Ex-political Prisoners Movement, National Democratic Party of Tibet and Students for a Free Tibet (India), through a press release issued today, said, “Instead of the usual celebrations marked by singing, dancing and other festivities, silence will be observed and butter lamps will be lit in the temples and homes to pray for the deceased.”

Dr. B. Tsering, president of the Tibetan Women's' Association, said, "This year, we honor the sacrifices of countless Tibetans who rose up to show China and the world that even after 50 years of brutal occupation, Tibetans are determined to regain our freedom."

Ven. Ngawang Woebar, president of Gu-Chu-Sum Ex-Political Prisoners' Movement, said, "On the eve of the commemoration of two historic uprisings - one in 1959 and the other in 2008 - we call on Tibetans worldwide to join us in re-dedicating ourselves to the cause of our nation."

"We mourn our brothers and sisters who were killed in China's violent crackdown while we stand in solidarity with those who continue to suffer under China's totalitarian rule," added Dr. B Tsering.

Meanwhile, young Tibetans expressed their will to skip the New Year celebrations at a weekend event called “Talk Tibet” where discussions are held and films are screened on Tibet. “This could be the singular historic moment of becoming the most participated Tibetan political event, simply because, it is an act of passive resistance, in which everybody can take part,” adding, “It is simple yet a very powerful nonviolent resistance against which China has no power.

Tsering, a monk from Kirti Monastery said, “No Losar” is a call I first heard from Tibet way back in November 2008 and the idea of nonparticipating has been spreading among Tibetans in Tibet and exile through blogs and word of mouth”.

Dhondup Lhadhar, General Secretary of Tibetan Youth Congress, who was at the discussion, said, “whatever we are doing, both inside or outside, our message should be one, it's to remember and pay tribute to the Tibetan martyrs of 2008 Tibet uprising and to mark 2009 as Black Year, as it is the 60 year of Chinese invasion of Tibet and 50 years of Chinese occupation of Tibet and our exile.”

With the Tibetans in Tibet wowing to skip celebrations this year of the Tibetan New Year, reports are coming in that the authorities in China are deliberately encouraging the Tibetans in Tibet to celebrate the New Year with pomp and festivity.

The authorities are giving out gifts and special presents to Tibetans to encourage them for celebrations, sources with contacts in Tibet told phayul. An anonymous person from Tibet has sent a poster calling for 'NO Losar' to phayul.

Tibetan New Year or Losar is one of the most auspicious and festive holidays in the Tibetan calendar and is traditionally celebrated with grandeur for a minimum of three days. This year Losar falls on 25th - 27th of February, just over two weeks before the 50th commemoration of the March 10th Tibetan National Uprising of 1959. March 10 will also mark one year since protests by Tibetan monks in Lhasa erupted into a nationwide uprising.

In

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China beats Tibetan youth to death

Pema Tsepak, one of the three Tibetan youths who protested in Dzogang county of the Chamdo prefecture of the Tibet Autonomous Region has died on January 23 after succumbing to his injuries sustained from beatings by Chinese authorities.

On January 20, the three Tibetans, identified as Thinley Ngodrub, 24, his brother Thargyal, 23, and Pema Tsepak, 24, all from Punda town in Tsawa Dzogang, had carried a white banner reading ‘Independence for Tibet,’ thrown paper fliers in the air, and shouted slogans, before getting arrested by the Chinese security forces. A Tibetan girl named Dechen Dolma, who was found in possession of Pema Tsepak’s mobile phone, was also detained but freed later on January 24.

According to Tsawa Community of Dharamsala, Pema was taken for treatment at Dzogang county hospital but he was so serious that he had to be taken to prefecture hospital in Chamdo where he succumbed to his injuries. Pema had sustained serious injuries to his intestine and kidney, Yeshi Tsomo of the Tsawa Community told phayul.

In a separate incident on Jan. 22, three Tibetans participated in a protest demonstration and were detained immediately. They were identified as Thinlay Gyatso, 44, Norbu Tashi, 29, and Lobsang Lhamo, 27, all from Tsawa Dzogang. Thinley Ngodrub and Thargyal are jailed in Chamdo (TAP) prison and Norbu Tashi in Dzogang county prison. Thinlay Gyatso and Lobsang Lhamo were released on January 24.

A candle light vigil and prayer session will be held here later today to mourn Pema’s death by the Tsawa Community in conjunction with the Tibetan Women's Association, Gu-Chu-Sum Ex-political Prisoners Movement, and Students for a Free Tibet (India).

The exile Tibetan government says the violent crackdown on Tibetan protesters following the unrest in March left 219 Tibetans dead, 1294 injured, 5,600 arrested or detained and more than 1000 still missing.

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Calling Tibet? Please Hang Up and Try Again

"You have the wrong house. I have no son." This is what 19-year-old Legdup heard when he called his mother in Tibet from Dharamsala, India. Sitting in a dark café with a tantalizing view of the Himalayan foothills that separates the North Indian state of Himachal Pradesh with his homeland, a monk nods silently when I tell him about Legdup, and confides that his own family back in Tibet refuse to speak with him. Another young man says that his mother has insisted that he stop calling her. Yangzom, a 24-year-old student who left Tibet in 2006, has given up trying to call home because she doesn't want to put her parents in danger. Ask anyone in this town and you hear the same story. People afraid to receive calls. People afraid to make them.

The fear is well founded. In April 2008, Radio Free Asia reported that a popular singer and writer, Jamyang Kyi, was detained and tortured for sending text messages to her friends about the protests. In November, the International Campaign for Tibet reported that a Tibetan woman named Norzin Wangmo was sentenced to five years imprisonment for trying to get information about the situation in Tibet by phone and internet to the outside world.

Your call might abruptly end in mid-sentence, say exiled Tibetans, especially if you mention anything "sensitive." One man I spoke with recently asked his aunt about the prison sentence of his brother who had been arrested for his participation in the Spring protests. Click! The line went dead. Sometimes callers from overseas hear Chinese voices on the line. A Tibetan-American man tells me that calls to his family near Lhasa often mysteriously re-route to a residence in India.

For Tibetans outside Tibet, this is simply another heartache in a long list that continues to plague them. Already cut off from friends and relatives through the reality of exile, they now have to sacrifice their last form of contact with those they love. "You have to try to put these things in perspective," says Alison Pinkney, a Scottish documentary filmmaker who has spent a lot of time speaking with young Tibetans in Dharamsala. "The worst thing I can expect when I call my mum in Scotland is a bad connection." Even if they manage to get the call through, Tibetans try to keep to the most mundane topics like food and the weather. "No matter what is going on, my family in Tibet will say, "I'm fine," a young NGO worker explains. "We know it's not true, but no one dares dig any deeper."
It's the self-censorship that muzzles the most. If you don't know where the line is, you will likely stop short of crossing it. Just in case. Everyone in Tibet knows that phone calls are monitored, and cell phones have proved to be no safer than landlines. Public Security Bureau police might turn up on your doorstep if you've been speaking to people overseas, particularly India -- for Beijing, the home of the much-maligned "Dalai Clique", and a place where Tibetans pick up dangerous notions like democracy and freedom of speech.

Article 19 of the UN Declaration of Human Rights describes the freedom "to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media regardless of frontiers." The architects of the Declaration clearly understood how the control of personal communications is key to the function of a modern police state such as is effectively in place in today's Tibet.

But as concerned as China's leaders may claim to be about popular dissent being fostered from outside influences, it is the homegrown freedom lobby that must be keeping them awake at night, especially when it hints at the unification of freedom movements within the country. The following comments were made during a Radio Free Asia call-in show. The caller is a Tibetan student named Losang who is studying in mainland China.

"Right now, a lot of us younger Tibetans inside Tibet feel that we need to do something to stand up...We are a people oppressed by another, and little by little, pieces are being cut off and destroyed....I feel that the people inside Tibet need to 'start the fire'...The Chinese are deceiving not only the world, but their own people with pictures of a peaceful Tibet...We need to work not only for the Tibetan people but for democracy for the whole of China."
In spite of Olympian efforts to the contrary, freedom is fast becoming a hot topic in China. And with 200,000 new cell phone accounts opening daily there, its surveillance industry will need to work over time to keep up with the conversation.

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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rebecca-novick/calling-tibet-please-hang_b_157598.html

Dalai Lama greets Chinese people on New Year

While lauding the progress China has made in terms of political, economic and military might, the Tibetan leader Dalai Lama said China “cannot perform the responsibility of a super power in this modern and progressive world if there is no freedom, rule of law and transparency in the country.”

The Tibetan leader today sent an open letter to the Chinese people wishing them on the Chinese New Year or the Spring Festival. “On the occasion of the Chinese New Year, or the Spring Festival, I extend my affectionate greetings to all our Chinese brothers and sisters across the globe, including those living in Mainland China.”The 73 year old Tibetan Nobel Laureate wrote that President Hu Jintao's policy of creating a harmonious society is indeed laudable but that “It cannot be brought about by brute force and autocracy.”“Such a policy is indispensable for China as well, if it were to make a mark globally. Harmonious society should, however, come about through mutual trust, friendship and justice.”

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