By Phuntsok Yangchen
DHARAMSHALA, April 1: Chinese authorities in Tibet’s Driru County have informed the families of two Tibetans arrested last year from Driru that they have been sentenced to prison terms up to thirteen years, a Tibetan exile from Driru said.
Tibetan writer Tsuiltrim Gyaltsen, 28, who wrote under pen name ‘Shokdril’ and his friend Yougyal, 27, a former policeman, have been sentenced to thirteen and ten years’ imprisonment respectively for “disturbing the social stability” and “misconduct with government officials.”
The family members who have been worried with no information on their whereabouts were shocked upon hearing about the sentence, said the source. The two are currently held at a prison in Chushul near Lhasa.
The authorities allowed one member from each family to visit the two in the prison recently and talk over the phone through a glass barrier. “Until then, no one knew about them since their arrest in October last year,” the source said, adding that the family members were told that “a peoples court of the Tibet Autonomous Region handed down the verdict on October 28, 2013.”
“The family members have been told that the court passed the sentence but were not shown any documentary evidence to confirm the trial. So it is doubtful if a trial has ever happened in the first place,” said the source who added that there were neither any lawyers to represent the two nor their families were informed of the trial.
Tsuiltrim was arrested from his home in Chusham Tenkhar village on the night on October 11. He was also accused for his involvement in the hunger strike by hundreds of people outside a Chinese police station in September last year demanding release of a Tibetan man named Dorje Dragtsel. Dorjee had refused to hoist a Chinese national flag atop his house due to which he was arrested. Police searched Tsuiltrim’s home and confiscated his laptop, mobile phone and some books.
In September last year, Tibetans of Mowa village clashed with Chinese security forces after defiant Tibetans refused to raise the Chinese flag and threw them into a river. The authorities propagated that the Tibetans must love their motherland and hoist Chinese national flag on their houses, leading to a standoff between the government authorities and the locals. Tsuiltrim and Yougyal were among those who stood up from the group to present the Tibetans’ demands, according to the same source.
A former monk of Palyul monastery in Derge, Tsuiltrim disrobed in 2001 before joining the Northwest University for Nationalities in Lanzhou and learned creative writing in Chinese language for four years. He was expelled from school months before his completion of the course. He was accused of being responsible for choosing topics for school debate that was “anti China.” After returning to his home town, Tsuiltrim started a guest house called “Mirap Sarpai Doenkhang” and voluntarily taught Tibetan language, Tibetan poetry and Chinese language to local Tibetan children. In 2007, he brought out his book Khawa la treng pai dungsem ki chongdra and Ghangri Lewang. In 2012, he co-authored a yearly journal called mirap sarpa. He also wrote regularly on his blog in Chinese language.
Yougyal joined the police service in 2005. He resigned from police service in 2012, and started his own business. He was known to be very kind and helpful as a policeman to local Tibetans.
