By Tenzin Choephel
Phayul Correspondent
Kathmandu, August 5 – Rinchen Sangpo, 30, a monk at Tsernga Monastery in Mangra County, Qinghai Province took a train from Lhasa Railway Station on 19th July to return home. But he never arrived home and his whereabout is not yet known. Originally from Tsernga Monastery of Shamdo, Mangra County, Tsolho Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Qinghai Province, he has been studying in Drepung Monastery for the past seven years. He is a writer and the editor of ‘Tsenpo Shabje’, a periodical of Thurig Monastery in Mangra County and to date he has written many critical articles criticising the Chinese authorities. It is speculated that the Public Security Bureau of Lhasa arrested him.
According to some sources, he was not feeling well and was returning home with two of his friends helping him to the Lhasa Railway Station. Two days later they called his home but he did not reach his home. His monastery also does not know where he is. Few days later, some officers of the Public Security Bureau came to Drepung Monastery and interrogated his two friends about him but they denied knowing anything about him. When they were shown their pictures at the Railway station taken by surveillance cameras and they became speechless.
Our source said that he is an outspoken person and have often challenged the officials in the monastery’s democratic committee.In 2000 he was arrested and detained for a couple of months. The same thing happened in 2003 and in 2005, during he was interrogated in connection with the death of a monk in Drepung Monastery. Police searched his room in the Monastery and found a picture of His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
Before his disappearance, he has written a researched book, which he tried to get it typed at a government computer resource center in Lhasa but the center refused. But it is not yet known whether his book was send for publishing.
Recently, over hundred intellectuals and critics of the Chinese government issued a petition that blaming the state’s tightening control of the media and opinions.
