Tibetans Risk Death to Flee Tibet
Tim Johnson, the Beijing bureau chief for McClatchy Newspapers, posted this in-depth article today, looking at how Tibetans risk death to flee over mountain border to Nepal. This is has been the way Tibetans have channeled their frustration and energy for the last fifty years – through pilgrimage to see the Dalai Lama and cultivating hope for a new life beyond oppression.
I received the article from my dad who commented: “here’s a story posted in todays Sacto Bee. Thought it of special interest considering most of us don’t know much about the plight of the Tibetans.”. It really hit me… I have been talking about the Tibetan issue with my family for years now, but here is my father saying that he really doesn’t know much! With all that is happening around the world, I can’t really expect him to either, but at the same time, he is open, willing to listen and to learn. I am glad he found this article, as it sheds great light on one aspect of the recent history of the Tibetan people.
A clip from the story:
The icy Nangpa Pass is a well-worn route. Thousands of Tibetan Buddhists have crossed it in recent decades, part of an exodus of Tibetans escaping Chinese religious and political control. The pass is 18,700 feet high, higher than any peak in North America except Mount McKinley in Alaska and Mount Logan in Canada.
…
Some 2,000 to 3,000 refugees trek across the Himalayas each year. They take no sleeping bags, no tents, no fluffy down jackets and no maps. The lucky ones have guides, and carry sheeting to use as tarps and plastic bags to wrap their feet. Most come in winter, when glacial crevasses freeze shut and Chinese border guards stick close to their heated outposts rather than roaming the frontier.
The article also mentions the Nangpa Pass Shootings where on “September 30, 2006 Chinese forces opened fire on a group of approximately 70 Tibetan refugees attempting to escape Tibet through the Nangpa Pass”. You can watch video footage of the shooting of unarmed Tibetans by Chinese Soliders. You view our earlier blog coverage of this event, as well: Kelsang Namtso, Murdered by Chinese soldiers.
a body in the snow on Nangpa
While the violence in recent days was not right, Tibetans should be given credit for their decades of restraint, for the violence they have faced at the hands of Chinese police and soldiers, and for the risks they have taken over and over again to connect with their brothers and sisters in India and Nepal.
Tibetan children detained by soliders
Read the full article from “Tibetans risk death to flee over mountain border to Nepal” in the Sacramento Bee
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