By Tenzin Monlam
DHARAMSHALA, October 14: Australian Researcher and Environmentalist, Gabriel Lafitte today in Dharamshala briefed about the new challenges faced by Tibetans inside Tibet and its consequences on the collective rights of the Tibetans.
Organized by the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights & Democracy (TCHRD), the Environmentalist, at a session titled ‘Beyond Individual Rights: Collective Rights to Development with Tibetan Characteristics,’ said since this year marks the beginning of China’s next five-year plan, attention must be paid to the their plans in Tibet over the next five years.
“We should give careful consideration to what impact they would have in Tibet and on the lives of every Tibetan living as farmers, nomads and city dwellers as well,” said Lafitte.
With over 30 years of experience of working with Tibetans, Lafitte also explained how the Chinese factories are now moving inland, much closer to Tibet, from the conventional factories on the coasts of China.
He also spoke of the highly integrated plan of building over 181 hydro-dams over the rivers of Tibet to cater the electricity demands of the factories in China’s biggest industrial cities situated over 2000 kms from Tibet.
“For the first time in Tibetan history, Tibetans now worry about the right to food, collective rights to food security and secure land tenure, as grazing rights and control of ancestral pastures are taken away.”
The Development Specialist on Tibet stated that the change from traditional ‘extensive land use’ to China’s ‘intensive land use’ have caused degradation due to intensive mining and concentration of population.
Rinzin Dolma, Environment Officer at Tibetan Women’s Association, said that the Chinese propaganda agencies have portrayed the displaced nomads as living happily with all the modern technologies at their disposal. “Irrespective of their claims, it is equivalent to prohibition of their basic human right and right to follow the their tradition,” she said.
