Zero Tibetans: a China – Nepal Nexus

Nepal’s Tibetan community of about 15,000-20,000 is made up of the relatives and descendants of an initial wave of refugees who arrived in Nepal following the Dalai Lama’s escape to India in 1959, and of periodic flows since then of new refugees and migrants coming from Tibet or returning from India. Since the Tibetian uprising in 2008, China has tightened its grip on the Tibetian community in Nepal. As a result of this pressure, Tibetans face excessive use of force by police, preventive detention, torture and ill-treatment when detained and intrusive surveillance.

There are reports of excessive Human Rights suppression at the hands of the Chinese authorities. Nepal, which has brought up its friendship with China to a whole new level in this decade, has signed several security and “intelligence-sharing” agreements with China since 2008. They have operationalized border security cooperation, partially enforced a ban on Tibetan public demonstrations, implemented close monitoring of the Tibetan community, its leaders, and real or perceived activists and deployed intimidating numbers of Nepali armed police in Tibetan neighborhoods on politically sensitive dates, such as the anniversary of the Dalai Lama, International Human Rights Day (December 10), or during high-level visits by Chinese dignitaries. The story of Chodak Namgyal a former Tibetan monk in his twenties briefly describes the suffering of Tibetians in the hands of the Chinese. The bone chilling account of the young monk is as follows:- Chodak arrived as a refugee in Nepal in January 2009.

A former member of the Tongkor monastery in Amdo, he had spent several months in hiding following a clash in April 2008 in which Chinese security forces shot at a crowd of Tibetan protesters, killing up to a dozen people. Many monks and participants in the protest, fearing arrest, fled into the mountains, where they remained in hiding, living in harsh conditions for many months, to escape the large and sustained operation by the local Chinese authorities to capture fugitives, whose pictures were on wanted posters in the area. Relatives were monitored and pressured for information about their relatives. Chodak and a companion decided to flee Tibet. They made their way to the border with Nepal, first hiding in the back of trucks and then continuing on foot, walking only at night. In January 2009, a Tibetan guide on the Chinese side near Dram, took them overnight across the border.

From there, they went to Kathmandu, travelling by motorbike and circumventing by foot numerous Nepali police checkpoints on the road. The two men took refuge in a Tibetan monastery in the Kathmandu valley for several weeks, before having to leave and hide in a Tibetan district in Kathmandu. Caught You! Tibetans caught by the Chinese authorities for crossing the border irregularly from Nepal are subjected to detention and imprisonment in abusive conditions. From the moment they are arrested, detainees are beaten by the police. When they are in detention, interrogators and guards routinely beat and torture detainees to coerce confessions or obtain information. Physical abuse, ill treatment, and torture are also used on detainees to terrorize them and break them psychologically.