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TCHRD calls on the Chinese authorities to put an immediate end to the zero-Covid policy in all its forms and hold government officials responsible for the avoidable death of Nangchen Tashi’s grandson. A thorough and impartial investigation must be launched into this tragedy so that similar violations and unnecessary loss of life can be prevented in the future.

On this Human Rights Day, we call on the Chinese government to immediately put an end to its inhumane and brutal ‘zero-Covid’ policy, release all persons detained for criticizing the government mismanagement of Covid measures, adopt a human rights approach to Covid control and prevention, and fulfill its treaty obligations by ensuring that the most basic of human rights such as dignity, freedom, and justice are accessible to all. 

The news about Goyon’s release comes close on the heels of another major development: sentencing of six former Tibetan political prisoners, writers and public intellectuals on the trumped-up charges of "inciting separatism" and "endangering state security" in Kardze (Ch: Ganzi) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province.

As reports emerged of massive protests staged by Chinese public against the government’s zero-Covid policy, sources in Tibet informed TCHRD about the discriminatory treatment and arbitrary detention of local Tibetans in the last three months in both Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) and other Tibetan areas.

Information received by TCHRD confirms the detention of four known Tibetans, among them an elderly woman, for merely engaging in the Tibetan Buddhist practice of making financial offerings to Tibetan spiritual teachers or Lamas (‘The Superior One’ or ‘The Venerable One’).

China’s strict enforcement of its zero-Covid policy in central parts of Tibet has so far forced five Tibetans to commit suicide. Five people who died of suicide on 23, 24 and 25 September were from Lhasa Comprehensive Protective Tariff Zone no. 2(West Lhasa), the Bayi community (southwest Norbulingka), Lanting apartment (near Tibet University), and Gakyiling neighbourhood 3 (east of Lhasa).

The Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy (TCHRD) is overcome with grief over the death of the prominent former political prisoner Jigme Gyatso AKA Labrang Jigme at about 12.15 pm local time on 2 July this year.

Today on the “International Day in Support of Victims of Torture", the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy expresses our solidarity with all political prisoners around the world particularly Tibetan political prisoners and their relatives who have suffered and continue to suffer the brutal effects of excessive and inhumane torture and abuse perpetrated by the government of the People’s Republic of China.

Tibetan intellectual and writer Thupten Lodoe (pseudonym: Sabuchey), 34, has been sentenced to four years and six months in prison, according to information received by TCHRD earlier today.

The Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy (TCHRD) has received information from reliable sources that the well-known Tibetan writer Rongwo Gendun Lhundup, 48, has been sentenced to four years in prison on the trumped-up charge of “inciting separatism”.