Dharamshala — Chinese authorities jailed the young Tibetan man for 16 months for openly criticising the Chinese government's failure to take action, against the Chinese company that was illegally extracting sand and destroying vast areas of riverbank, during the construction of a road on the banks of a river in Gakog County, Ngawa, Tibet.
The young Tibetan man, named Tsowoe Tsering (Tsering) openly reported Anhui Xianhe Construction Engineering Co, Ltd, on October 15, 2024, for illegal sand mining during the construction of road on the banks of a river in Tsa-Ri-Ma Township (ཚ་རི་མ་ཡུལ་ཚོ), Gakog County (རྐང་ཁོག་རྫོང་།) in Ngawa, Tibet. Tsering's report and criticism came after the local Tibetans have reported these cases to local, regional and higher Chinese authorities for last two years, but no action taken by the Chinese authorities to resolve their problem.
Tsering posted videos on his social media account (Wehcat) on October 15, 2024, showing his name and identity card. He openly reported on the Chinese company Anhui Xianhe Construction Engineering Co, Ltd (安徽先河建筑工程有限公司) and criticised the Chinese local and central government for taking no action against illegal sand mining and environmental destruction in Tsa-Ri-Ma Township. Tsering's video has gained great attention among Tibetans in Tibet and in exile. Tsering arrested by Chinese authorities on October 16, 2024
Tsering was sentenced to eight months' imprisonment by the Gakog County Court on October 27, 2024, for “disrupting social order”. However, Tsering denied his crime and the Chinese authorities jailed him another eight months for not accepting their so-called crime by the Gakog County Court recently. He is now serving a 16-month prison sentence in Barkham County, Ngawa, eastern Tibet. Details such as the date of his conviction and his state of health are not known, due to China's tight control over his families and the flow of information from Tibet to the world.
The Chinese authorities have warned his family members not to talk about his case, and their movements have been closely monitored. Family members were also prevented from visiting him or taking part in religious activities during the Tibetan New Year.
Tsering said in the video on October 15, 2024, “My name is Tsowoe Tsering and I live in the town of Tsa-Ri_Ma, in Gakog County. I want to report the Anhui River Construction Engineering Co. for illegal sand mining and damage to the ecological environment while construction of roads in the area.”
He said while showing the serious damage of river sites by the Chinese company in the video, “Since May 2023, the company's illegal sand mining activities have seriously damaged the local environment, and large quantities of river. River sand has been extracted indiscriminately, leading to serious water loss in the neighborhood and crisis of the foundations of residential strata”.
“The river water of Tsa-Ri-Ma Township, which is mined, belongs to the watercourse of the Yangtze River and the Yellow River, and this kind of destructive behavior seriously threatens the safety of the water sources of the Yangtze River and the Yellow River. The pollution of the Yangtze and Yellow River tributaries is closely related to the local ecological environment and biodiversity protection, and directly affects the Asian water tower and plateau wetlands,” Tsering added.
Tsering said, “Therefore, It is essential to strengthen ecological protection and governance, given the scale of the ecological damage and the serious consequences for local residents. Some villagers voluntarily reported the situation to the local authorities in Tsa-Ri_Ma, Gokog County People's Government, Ngawa Prefecture, and provided a large number of photos and videos of the destruction and damage to river sites and the environment. However, no action has been taken by the relevant authorities, and the environmental problems have not been dealt with in depth. These authorities are on the company's side, hiding the crimes committed by the company's managers.”
“The soil erosion becomes more and more serious and the situation becomes more and more serious, the results of the destruction of the ecological environment by Chinese company, Tibetans have to bear the consequences,” Tsering said.
“There is no door for the complainant and no one to manage it. Although a good policy on ecological and environmental protection was introduced many years ago, but lack of implementation of the policy on our land. The danger to the people continues and there is a lack of knowledge and inaction in the process of dealing with the environmental problems, and there is a lack of thorough management of the environmental problems,” he added.
The young Tibetan said with worrying, “Ecosystem collapse will be an irreversible disaster. We have lived on this land for generations, and the quality of the ecological environment directly affects the health and life safety of future generations.”
“If we do not punish those who destroy the ecological environment in accordance with the law, similar problems will arise again. I urge the central leadership to pay attention to this issue and to ecological environmental protection, to find out the truth from the facts, to conduct on-site investigations of local ecological damage, and to thoroughly investigate the legal responsibilities of offending enterprises in accordance with the law,” Tsering concluded his appeal with a heavy heart.
China's destruction of Tibet's environment is nothing new; since China illegally occupied Tibet in the 1950s, the Chinese government has been severely destroying and degrading Tibet's environment through mining and in the name of building roads, railways and dams. Chinese authorities arrest Tibetan environmentalists and sentence them to years in prison for protesting against the destruction of Tibet's environment.
