The Tibetan PM in exile, Sikyong Dr. Lobsang Sangay on Sunday criticized the Chinese government for imposing strict restrictions against the Tibetans from inside Tibet from attending the 34th Kalachakra teachings by His Holiness the Dalai Lama in India. He also told at the press conference that the state of religious freedom in Tibet is highly repressed by China.
“Thousands of pilgrims have come from Tibet purely to take part in a spiritual event. They have attained legal permit to travel here. The Chinese government threatening Tibetan pilgrims to return immediately under such severe pressure is simply unacceptable. It is in clear violation of International human rights norms,” said Sikyong, according to the official report of Central Tibetan Administration.
“The Chinese government has charged severe travel restrictions on Tibetans in Tibet in a bid to block their travel to India to attend the 34th Kalachakra Initiation–a prominent Buddhist ceremony led by the most revered Tibetan spiritual leader His Holiness the Dalai Lama at Bodh Gaya. Thousands of pilgrims, who have already arrived in Nepal and India have been summoned back to Tibet under threats of severe punishment.” said the report further.
“Taking advantage of the presence of the Dalai Lama, the Kalachakra (wheel of time) teachings have inveigled Tibetans into illegally going abroad over the last decade,” Zhu Weiqun, chairman of the Ethnic and Religious Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, told state-run Global Times few days back..
“Therefore, the government by no means threatened them to return, although the government does not encourage them to attend the ritual,” Xu Zhitao, deputy director of the bureau of the Tibet question at the United Front Work Department of the Communist Party of China Central Committee told the Global Times few days back.
The Tibetan PM in exile, Sikyong Dr. Lobsang Sangay argued against the allegations “I have personally met hundreds of them. After many years of hard work, they have been able to visit India and Nepal and for the simple purpose to visit the place of Buddha’s enlightenment and seek spiritual blessings.”
“Thousands of them have now scrambled and returned back to Tibet because the authorities had threatened the family members of cutting subsidies, jobs and severe consequence if they don’t return between 1 – 15 January.” he added against the statements issued by the Chinese authorities.
Protesting discriminatory restraints faced by Tibetans applying for passports in Tibet, he said, “It can be categorically stated that 90 per cent of Tibetans in Tibet are not issued passports while large majority of Chinese are issued passports and are traveling all over the world.” If Tibetans are “the masters of their regions” as offered in Chinese White Paper on Tibet, they should be allowed to travel free, Sikyong urged.
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