Dharamsala, April 25 (TCHRD) - The reincarnate 11th Panchen Lama will celebrate his 10th birthday on April 25, 1999, marking his fifth year of detention by the People's Republic of China (PRC). Meanwhile the PRC continues to promote its substitute Panchen Lama, forcing monks and lay people to worship a boy they do not recognise as a reincarnate.

The life of the past 10th Panchen Lama was fraught with turbulence. He was maltreated by the Chinese authorities for his criticisms of China's intervention in Tibet and was often misunderstood by his own people as a Chinese pawn.

In May 1962, the 10th Panchen Lama submitted a 70,000 character petition to the Chinese premier Zhou Enlai, condemning the "liberation" of Tibet by the People's Liberation Army (PLA), as having done more damage than good for the Tibetan people. He also made other derogatory remarks about Chinese policies. Following the report, he was subjected to struggle sessions (Tibetan: Thamzing) for seven weeks and later faced more severe treatment. For the next 14 years, the Panchen Lama was incarcerated in China under house arrest. Even after he was released from detention, his opinions remained unshaken. He continued to improve the living standards of the Tibetan people by building schools and corporations to generate employment, which earned him the term, the "fat businessman".

On January 17, 1989, when he appeared at a public gathering in Shigatse to perform a consecration of his predecessors, the 10th Panchen Lama openly called for the Dalai Lama to be allowed to work with him in Tibetan policy-making. This was the last straw for the Chinese authorities. On January 28, 1989, just a few days after a statement by the Panchen Lama condemning China appeared in the official Beijing news agency, the 10th Panchen Lama passed away under mysterious circumstances. He allegedly died from a "heart attack" and was labelled "reactionary traitor".

Ten years later, we celebrate the 10th birthday of the reincarnate 11th Panchen Lama, Gedhun Choekyi Nyima. The young boy who turns 10 today, has been missing since he was six years old. On May 14,1995, His Holiness the Dalai Lama recognised Gedhun Choekyi Nyima as the reincarnate Panchen Lama. On May 17, the boy and his parents disappeared from their home. The Chinese government denied allegations by the Tibetan government-in-exile and other concerned organisations that he had disappeared at the hands of the PRC government. A few months after the disappearance, the PRC government appointed its own Panchen Lama. A year later, in 1996, it admitted to holding the 11th Panchen Lama "at the request of his parents" for "he was at risk of being kidnapped by separatists and his security had been hreatened". Thus, despite its repudiation of the Dalai Lama's authority in recognising the Panchen Lama, and its refusal to acknowledge Gedhun Choekyi Nyima as being the true reincarnation, the Chinese government has nonetheless justified the detention of the child on the basis of concern. It is puzzling that the Chinese authorities should go to such lengths to provide security for a child whom they do not consider as anyone other than an ordinary boy.

Information from refugees fleeing Tibet, and travellers, indicates that pictures of the Chinese appointed Panchen Lama are displayed in Tibet, particularly in the main monasteries and tourist hotels in Shigatse (the seat of the Panchen Lama). In the meantime, pictures of His Holiness and the true 11th Panchen Lama are banned throughout Tibet. In May 1996, the PRC launched its "Strike Hard" Campaign of "patriotic re-education" in monasteries and nunneries in the Tibetan region. Under the auspices of that campaign, the PRC promotes recognition of the Chinese appointed Panchen Lama.

We hope Gedhun Choekyi Nyima will celebrate his next birthday as a free boy.

Hollywood Star Supports Tibetan Hunger Strikers

GENEVA, Apr. 26, 1999 -- (Reuters) Hollywood star Richard Gere offered his support to a Tibetan hunger strike in Geneva on Sunday and blasted China for sidestepping scrutiny of its human rights record.

Gere, a prominent campaigner against Chinese rule in Tibet, visited three hunger strikers camping on a patch of grass outside the United Nations building. He accused China of carrying out a "50-year genocide" against Tibetans and drew a comparison between the situations in Tibet and in Kosovo.

"We're dealing with obviously a very chaotic and violent world right now and we're seeing in former Yugoslavia the explosion of these ethnic problems," Gere told reporters, adding that he would go on to the Balkans after visiting Geneva.

He praised Tibetans for pursuing non-violent protest against Chinese rule.

"They come here to the U.N. Commission on Human Rights and they've in fact been ignored. The Chinese have been very, very powerful and effective at bullying votes," Gere said.

The Commission, a U.N. forum in Geneva with 53 member states, is currently holding its annual session. On Friday, Beijing gathered enough support to shelve a U.S. motion on China which mentioned concern about Tibet.

"The very reason why this commission exists has been sidestepped by the Chinese lobby," Gere said. "So I think it's very important for the press and for people to know that the Tibetan movement is very powerful."

The Chinese delegation on Friday successfully brought a "no-action motion" against the U.S. resolution, preventing the text being debated or voted upon in the forum. Gere praised U.S. efforts to highlight Tibet and urged European countries to follow suit. Washington's resolution was not co-sponsored by any members of the European Union.

Chinese troops swept into Tibet in 1950, putting an end to centuries of near-autonomy in the Himalayan territory.

Organizers of the Geneva hunger strike say the three protesters have not eaten since April 5.

One of their demands is that China allow a U.N. delegation to visit the young boy who has been designated as the reincarnation of Tibet's second highest spiritual leader, the Panchen Lama, and whose welfare is the object of international concern.

China Escapes U.N. Rights Censure, Scoffs At U.S.

BEIJING, Apr. 26, 1999 -- (Reuters) Beijing thumbed its nose at Washington on Saturday after the U.N. Commission on Human Rights shelved a U.S. resolution criticizing China's human rights record.

"The United States is isolated in this anti-China farce," Foreign Ministry spokesman Sun Yuxi told reporters. "It's natural for the anti-China resolution to end in failure."

Beijing won enough support for a "no action motion" in the 53-member U.N. body in Geneva on Friday to quash all debate on the U.S. resolution critical of China. The vote on the motion was 22 to 17, with 14 abstentions.

Sun noted that not even the European Union and other traditional U.S. allies had co-sponsored the U.S. motion. Poland co-sponsored it at the last minute.

"The result again demonstrated that to interfere in other countries' internal affairs and pursue hegemonism and power politics under the pretext of human rights could not win popular support," Sun said.

"Confrontation is not the way out," he said. "The move was against the current trend in the international human rights arena to advocate dialogue and oppose confrontation."

China has escaped Western attempts to censure it at the U.N. body every year since 1990, the first session that followed the student killings at Beijing's Tiananmen Square in June 1989.

Sun defended China's human rights record, saying Beijing has always attached importance to human rights and made unswerving efforts to promote and improve the human rights situation.

But the United States ignored improvements in China's human rights record and again tabled an anti-Beijing resolution to defame China's international image due to "domestic political needs and partisan struggle", Sun said.

The United States, in a statement issued in Geneva by Assistant Secretary of State Harold Hongju Koh, said it was "deeply disappointed" with the vote.

It accused Chinese authorities of having begun a "crackdown against organized political opposition" since late 1998.

China jailed three dissidents for up to 13 years late last year for trying to set up the opposition China Democracy Party in defiance of a ban on new political parties.

The United States urged China to "quickly bring its human rights practices into compliance" with international law. The U.S. motion expressed concern about alleged abuses, citing unfair trials, harsh sentences and "increased restrictions" in Tibet.

China's envoy Qiao Zonghuai called on member states to back its no-action motion and dismissed the alleged abuses contained in the U.S. resolution as "totally groundless".

"The United States keeps nagging China over trials of a few criminals in China's judiciary," Qiao said, adding that there were "gross violations of human rights" in the United States.

The New York-based Human Rights in China denounced the commission's decision to shelve the resolution as "unjustifiable and irresponsible".

"China is experiencing a period of severe repression. Yet the commission is silent," Xiao Qiang, executive director of the human rights group, said in a statement.

"The world's highest human rights body has failed to uphold its mandate," he said.

It was a "moral imperative and a practical necessity" to hold China accountable for its human rights abuses, Xiao added.

[ Homepage ] [ NewsRoom ]



This site is maintained and updated by The Office of Tibet, the official agency of His Holiness His Holiness the Dalai Lama in London. This Web page may be linked to any other Web sites. Contents may not be altered.
Last updated: 27-April-99