By Phurbu Thinley
Dharamsala, April 8: Tibetan middle school students in Machu County in Gansu Province (traditionally in Tibet’s Amdo Province), last week staged yet another peaceful protest against government controls, a Tibetan exile having contacts in the region said.
The students of Machu Tibetan Nationality Middle School led by its senior students staged a peaceful protest around 3pm local time on April 3, Dolkar Kyab, a researcher and native of Machu currently living here in Dharamsala, India, said.
The students were protesting against the firing of the school’s headmaster and two of his Tibetan assistants from their jobs by Chinese authorities last month, Kyab said, citing sources in the region.
The school’s headmaster Kyabchen Dedrol, and his two assistants—Do Re and Choekyong Tseten—were fired by Chinese authorities following a pro-independence protest by students of the school towards the second week of March.
Tseten was later secretly taken away by officials from the Public Security Bureau. His whereabouts are unknown, Kyab said.
As a result, the school students approached relevant Chinese officials in the county government and submitted petitions demanding the authorities to reinstate the three sacked school heads.
In the petition, the students maintained there would be further protests if their demands in the petitions were not not met by the government, Kyab said.
The peaceful protest last week was staged after Chinese authorities turned a deaf ear to their petition, Kyab added.
The Tibetan middle School reportedly comprises about 1,500 students.
The latest peaceful protest is the second one by the students of the middle school and one of the series of protests by Tibetan school students in Gansu Province in as many weeks.
March is the anniversary of both Tibetan National Uprising against Chinese rule in 1959 and the massive anti-China unrest across Tibetan areas in 2008.
Kyab said it was not clear if authorities had detained any student or staff member of the school after the latest protest.
“At the moment the school is completely surrounded by armed police and the students are forced to remain confined to school compound. They are also barred from meeting or making any contact with the outsiders,” Kyab said.
Authorities also deployed extra security forces in the already tense Machu town and set up checkpoints, tightening restriction on the movement of people, particularly the monks in the area, Kyab added.
The increase security presence is said to be causing tension and fear in the area.
Meanwhile, the students of the middle school have vowed to carry on with more protests until the reinstatement of the school’s headmaster and his two assistants.
Tibetan language teacher arrested in Machu
Chinese authorities in Machu County also made a surprise arrest of a Tibetan language teacher of a Tibetan elementary school last month, Kyab told Phayul.
Topdhen, a Tibetan language teacher at Machu Tibetan Nationality Primary School, was arrested on March 28 by Chinese officials from the so-called “Public Security Bureau”.
Information on his whereabouts and well-being, and the exact reasons for his arrest are unknown at the moment, Kyab said.
Born in 1971, Topdhen was ordained as a monk and joined Nyul-ra Ngenthok Monastery after completing his primary schooling. In 1999 he defied the Communist China’s “Patriotic re-education” campaign being conducted in his monastery by refusing to denounce His Holiness the Dalai Lama. A year later, unable to bear the religious repression, he came to exile in India and enrolled at a Tibetan school in Dharamsala.
He returned to Tibet in 2006 after the completion of his studies.
