By Phuntsok Yangchen
DHARAMSHALA, November 27: The Speaker of the Tibetan Parliament, Penpa Tsering, today launched a book by a member of Tibetan Parliament here at Nyatri Hall in Gangchen Kyishong. Titled “Self-Immolation” and written by Jamyang Soepa, the book attempts to provide a comprehensive analysis of cases of self-immolation in the world in general and Tibet in particular.
The writer said his book analyses the responses and the stands adopted by the Tibetan government in exile (officially known as Central Tibetan Administration) and the world towards the cases of self-immolation protest and elaborates how China blames exile Tibetans for instigating and organizing self-immolation protest and how eventually these accusations and indictments were foiled.
At the book launch, Speaker Penpa Tsering referred to the writer as an active parliamentarian and congratulated him on completing the book. Also present were other members of the Tibetan parliament.
“Of 132 Tibetan self-immolators in Tibet, 113 died while others have survived with both physical and psychological trauma. The Chinese government not only punishes the self-immolators if they survived, but also their family members and eye-witnesses or bystanders.”
Suggesting the writer to translate the book into other languages, Speaker Tsering said, “For Tibetans or non-Tibetans who do not understand why Tibetans are burning themselves, this book if translated into English and Chinese and other languages would be very useful.”
The book also contains the names and pictures of the self-immolators both inside and outside Tibet, dates and places of the self-immolation protests, current status and last messages of the self-immolators.
“When self-immolation protest first began in Tibet, like many others, I had a new feeling because it was a new form of campaign and many debates regarding the form of protest followed. So, I wrote this book with a hope to highlight how we should look at these self-immolation protests,” said Jamyang.
He also noted that the views and opinions expressed in the book are solely his and not that of the Tibetan Parliament in exile.
The writer hopes that this book would help the future generation to study and spread awareness to the world about situation inside Tibet.
The book was published by Tibetan Parliamentary and Policy Research Centre.
