Dharamshala – The Chinese authorities in Ngawa county, eastern Tibet, sentenced a Tibetan monk, Lobsang Thamke, to three years in prison, after a year in detention. He had been arrested in June 2023 for allegedly publishing Tibetan books from outside Tibet and contacting Tibetans in exile.
Tibetan monk Lobsang Thamke, former director of the Kirti monastery library in Ngawa county, eastern Tibet, was arrested by Chinese authorities in Ngawa county in June, 2023, for allegedly publishing Tibetan books from outside Tibet and contacting Tibetans in exile. The Chinese government has banned Tibetans from contacting their family members in exile and books by Tibetans in exile, particularly books related to His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Kirti Rinpoche.
According to TPI's previous report, "Thamke was arrested by Chinese police, in June, 2023, for allegedly publishing Tibetan books from the three major Geluk monasteries in the southern India and for contacting Tibetans in the Exile."
Lobsang Thamke, aged 55, from the village of Meuruma in Ngawa county, eastern Tibet. His father's name is Katson and his mother's name is Shuka. He was director of the Kirti Liberary monastery in Ngawa county. Chinese authorities secretly sentenced Lobsang to three years' imprisonment in a 'secret' trial and he is now serving his sentence in Deyang Prison in Sichuan, China.
According to RFA, Lobsang Thamke was sentenced to three years in prison, and while the specific charges against Thabkhey are unknown, sources said they were likely related to previous charges of publishing books from exile and contacting Tibetans in exile. Thabkhey's family only recently learned of the sentence, but the authorities have provided no information about the date of the trial or the nature of the charges.
Kirti Rinpoche said on August 24, 2024 while receiving a Literary Award for writing over 140 books, "My many books were printed in Tibet in the early years, but later the Chinese government arrested the monks and people who were responsible for these books; people were imprisoned by the Chinese authorities simply for having photos and books of these books. Later, the Chinese government banned all my books in Tibet, forbidding their printing and distribution, and even confiscated the funds intended for printing in Tibet." Therefore, Lobsang Thamke was one of monks arrested by Chinese authorities for printing Kirti Rinpoche's books.
According to reliable Tibetan sources to TPI, in 2023 the Chinese authorities tightened restrictions on the publication of Tibetan books, particularly books from outside Tibet. The Chinese authorities also closed publishing houses in Tibet and a Tibetan publisher in Ngawa county was sentenced to three years in prison for publishing Tibetan books. But the TPI was unable to find any further details, such as the person sentenced, his name, place of origin, or the reasons or charges for his three-year imprisonment, due to the severe restrictions imposed by the Chinese authorities on the circulation of information about Tibetans.
China-Tibet: The one-thing you need to know
Over the past 70 decades, there has been ongoing political repression, social discrimination, economic marginalization, environmental destruction, and cultural assimilation, particularly due to Chinese migration to Tibet which is fueling intense resentment among the people of occupied Tibet.
The communist-totalitarian state of China began its invasion of Tibet in 1949, reaching complete occupation of the country in 1959. Since that time, more than 1.2 million people, 20% of the nation's population of six million, have died as a direct result of China's invasion and occupation. In addition, over 99% of Tibet's six thousand religious monasteries, temples, and shrines, have been looted or decimated resulting in the destruction of hundreds of thousands of sacred Buddhist scriptures.
Until 1949, Tibet was an independent Buddhist nation in the Himalayas which had little contact with the rest of the world. It existed as a rich cultural storehouse of the Mahayana and Vajrayana teachings of Buddhism. Religion was a unifying theme among the Tibetans -- as was their own language, literature, art, and world view developed by living at high altitudes, under harsh conditions, in a balance with their environment.
