A Tibetan man who shouted slogans and set himself on fire last week in a protest in front of the iconic Potala Palace in the Tibet regional capital Lhasa has been identified as a popular contemporary Tibetan singer, sources in the region and in India told RFA Saturday.
Tsewang Norbu, 25, died after the Feb. 25 self-immolation attempt, which initial accounts said was thwarted by police.
“Tsewang Norbu tried to protest the Chinese government by attempting to self-immolate and according to few of my reliable sources from inside Tibet, (he) has died,” a Tibetan living in exile told RFA.
The date and place of his death could not immediately be confirmed. RFA could not reach his family and relatives in Lhasa. Norbu’s mother, Sonam Wangmo, is also a well-known artist in China, the exile source said.
The comment section on Norbu’s social media accounts have been deactivated due to abundant inflow of condolence messages, while many of his songs are now removed from many Chinese music apps, the source said.
A singer and composer of modern, ethnic, popular, traditional songs, Norbu released the songs “Tsampa,” “Dress Up” and “Except You” among many that werepopular among the Tibet community at home and abroad.
The massive hilltop Potala that dominates the Lhasa skyline was the winter palace of historic Dalai Lamas from 1649 until 1959, when the current Dalai Lama fled to India after an uprising against Chinese rule over the formerly independent Himalayan region, triggering a crackdown in which the palace was shelled and thousands were killed by Chinese troops.
A second source from the large Tibetan exile community in India confirmed having heard of the Potala incident but also had no further details.
With Norbu’s death, 158 Tibetans are confirmed to have set themselves on fire since 2009 to protest Chinese rule in Tibetan areas, and another eight have taken their lives in Nepal and India.
The previous report of a self-immolation was that of a 26-year-old man named Shurmo, who set himself ablaze in September 2015 in the Tibet Autonomous Region’s Nagchu (Chinese, Naqu) county. His death was confirmed only in January of last year.
Friday’s aborted self-immolation bid occurred in the run up to the March 10 anniversary of the 1959 rebellion, known as Tibetan National Uprising Day, a period when the Chinese government usually tightens control and surveillance.
High-technology controls on phone and online communications in Tibetan areas often prevent news of Tibetan protests and arrests from reaching the outside world.
Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader the Dalai Lama is reviled by Chinese leaders as a separatist intent on splitting Tibet, which was invaded and incorporated into China by force in 1950, from Beijing’s control.
The Dalai Lama himself says only that he seeks a greater autonomy for Tibet as a part of China, though, with guaranteed protections for Tibet’s language, culture, and religion.
Chinese authorities maintain a tight grip on the region, restricting Tibetans’ political activities and peaceful expression of ethnic and religious identity, and subjecting Tibetans to persecution, torture, imprisonment, and extrajudicial killings.
Translated by Tenzin Dickyi for RFA’s Tibetan Service. Written in English by Paul Eckert.
Nearly 800 Uyghurs are being held in a detention camp in Manas county in northwestern China’s Xinjiang, said an official from the area who previously worked at the facility.
Manas county (in Chinese, Manasi) is part of the Changji Hui (Changji Huizu) Autonomous Prefecture and covers an area of nearly 9,200 square kilometers (3,550 square miles).
The camp is divided into two adjacent sections, with one housing about 500 male detainees and the other holding about 270 women — all of whom are ethnic minority Uyghurs, said the official, who did not give his name but said he worked at the detention center for four months.
The official also said that the Uyghur inmates had been arrested for committing “serious crimes,” such as praying, and that inside the facility they learned “the national language” of Mandarin Chinese.
“They were divided by an iron fence — males about 500 and females about 270,” he said. “There was no torture of women. They were taught Chinese. These ones [committed] serious crimes — people who prayed five times a day.”
Chinese authorities have targeted and arrested Muslim Uyghur businessmen, intellectuals, and cultural and religious figures in Xinjiang for years as part of a campaign to monitor, control and assimilate members of the minority group.
At least 1.8 million Uyghurs and other Turkic minorities are believed to have been held in a network of detention camps in Xinjiang since 2017, purportedly to prevent religious extremism and terrorist activities.
Beijing has said that the camps are vocational training centers. The government has denied widespread allegations that it has tortured people in the camps or mistreated other Muslims living in Xinjiang.
Changji Hui Autonomous Prefecture has a population of more than 1.6 million people, according to China’s latest census data on Xinjiang issued in June 2021.
Among the residents of prefecture are members of the Xinjiang Construction and Production Corps, a state-owned economic and paramilitary organization based in Manas. The corps, which also is known as Bingtuan, has been sanctioned by the U.S. for its alleged involvement in human rights violations against Uyghurs.
Relatively few Uyghurs live in the county. Census figures put Manas’ population at 247,000 people, of whom only 6,200 are Uyghurs, or about 2.5 percent of the total. The 19,513 ethnic Kazakhs who also live there account for 7.9 percent of its population.
Earlier RFA reports found that many Kazakhs had been detained in internment camps in Manas and Kuytun (Kuitun), a county-level city in Ili Kazakh (Yili Hasake) Autonomous Prefecture, which is also in the northern part of Xinjiang.
In other earlier reports, sources said a large number of detainees in the Ghulja (Yining) area had been transferred to Manas county and to the cities of Shiho (Wusu) and Urumqi (Wulumuqi), which is Xinjiang’s capital.
In early January, RFA reported on the disappearance and imprisonment of Hasiyet Ehmet, a 57-year-old resident of Manas who is serving a 14-year prison sentence for teaching children the Quran and hiding two copies of the sacred text during a time when police began confiscating religious books from residents.
RFA reported that additional internment camps may be operating in Manas, despite the relatively low number of Uyghurs who live there.
RFA contacted police stations, prisons and judiciary offices in Manas county in an effort to find out the number of detention camps operating there, but most officials who were reached said they were not authorized to provide any information.
One said there was only one internment camp in the county, although he did not state its location. Another official said the camp was located inside the county center but could not comment on the number of detainees.
“There’s only one in Manas. It is in the county center,” he said.
When RFA asked one of the officials how many Kazakhs were in the camp in Manas county, he initially said there are none before declining to comment.
“There are no Kazakhs. Don’t ask this. We are not allowed to speak about this,” he said.
Global attention continues to focus on Xinjiang and the well-documented allegations of abuse.
On Thursday, the House of Lords in the United Kingdom passed an amendment to ensure the country’s National Health Service, the publicly funded health care system in England, cannot purchase goods or services from a region where there is a serious risk of genocide.
Last year, the British Parliament designated that abuses against Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims in Xinjiang constituted a genocide.
The NHS measure, which still must be approved by the House of Commons, drew praise from Uyghur rights groups.
In response to the amendment’s passage, Rahima Mahmut, U.K. director of the World Uyghur Congress, tweeted: “I’m deeply grateful to everyone who has worked so tirelessly on this amendment so far … I know how much this win means for our community.”
Translated by RFA’s Uyghur Service. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is being portrayed in varying ways by news outlets serving nearly two billion readers in East and Southeast Asia. Chinese media are offering Moscow-friendly coverage and censoring the rest, while some of its more democratic neighbors are delivering balanced and occasionally pro-Ukraine reporting.
Over the past week, RFA and affiliated BenarNews surveyed news media coverage of the crisis in the countries we cover that run the gamut from Marxist-Leninist governments in China, Vietnam, North Korea and Laos, to more liberal countries in Southeast Asia, where audiences often sample news media that would be familiar to people in the West. Those countries are carrying international wire reports and hosting lively debate. They also focus on the plight of their expatriates living and working in Ukraine.
Predictably, the region’s more authoritarian nations have much more controlled messaging, reflecting historic ties between Moscow and its Communist friends in Asia – apparent at this week’s UN General Assembly 141-5 vote in favor of condemning the invasion of Ukraine, where China, Laos and Vietnam all abstained. North Korea, which has the most closed media of any nation in the world, voted against the U.N. measure and has been mostly silent on Ukraine.
Here is a quick look at the region’s media coverage of the war. Countries are listed along with their ranking in the annual World Press Freedom Index by the France-based watchdog Reporters Without Borders. (For reference, the index ranks Ukraine at 97 out of 180 countries, while Russia is at 150).
This handout photo taken and released on by the Ukraine delegation shows delegation members holding banners to call for peace prior to the opening ceremony of the Beijing 2022 Winter Paralympic Games at the National Stadium in Beijing, March 4, 2022. Credit: AFP
China 177/180
Chinese state media have struggled like the government that controls and directs them to reconcile widening gaps between the official line that stops short of calling the Russian campaign an invasion and the fast unfolding horrors being inflicted on the people in Ukraine by Russian forces.
State media have been using a lot of content from Russian media reports, to the point that “official media have pretty much become the mouthpiece of the Russian media,” said Renmin University journalism graduate Lu Nan.
He told RFA the CCP’s shadowy “public opinion management” operations were encouraging pro-Russian comments on social media, while comments critical of Moscow get censored swiftly.
“They only allow one voice to exist, so all of the comments are supportive of Putin,” Lu said. “No dissenting voices are allowed to appear.”
State media propaganda sits uneasily with a tide of social media reports from Chinese on the ground in Ukraine including students begging to be evacuated amid shelling by Russian forces.
Vietnam (175/180)
Vietnamese media are covering the conflict in great detail. While much of the coverage is pro-Moscow, there is less pro-Russia bias than when Russia annexed Crimea in 2014.
Nhan Dan daily, the mouthpiece of Vietnam’s ruling Communist Party, reported both sides’ arguments at Tuesday’s United Nations Security Council’s emergency meeting on Ukraine. It carried quotes by not only the Russian and Chinese representatives but also by the U.S. ambassador to the U.N. and a statement from the Ukrainian president.
The official Vietnam News Agency’s online newspaper, Bao Tin Tuc, while dedicating most space to the Russian accounts of the crisis, also reported on the West’s condemnation of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s recognition of the two breakaway regions in eastern Ukraine, as well as the European sanctions against Moscow.
Laos (172/180)
Mainstream media in Laos is state-run, and the sparse coverage it has of the Ukraine conflict leans heavily on the Chinese state news agency, Xinhua, which in turns leans heavily on Russia’s view of events.
A March 3 headline in the Vientiane Times reads: “Fighting continues as Russia’s ‘special military operation’ in Ukraine has entered the seventh day, while a new round of peace talks is reportedly to take place.” The same report gives most prominence to a quote from the Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu who vows to continue the military operation in Ukraine until achieving the main goal of “defending Russia from Western threats.”
This handout picture taken on June 22, 2021 and released by the Russian Defence Ministry on June 23, 2021, shows Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu (L) and Commander-in-Chief of Myanmar’s armed forces, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing as they walk past the honor guard prior to their talks in Moscow. Credit: AFP
Myanmar (140/180 before the Feb. 1, 2021 military coup)
Military junta-controlled state media favor Russia. It is one of the few countries to support the military regime that ousted an elected government a year ago. Moscow has continued to sell arms to the junta despite widespread atrocities.
The Myanmar state newspapers cover the Ukraine crisis by printing translated stories directly from Russia’s TASS news agencies and China’s CGTN news, while pro-military nationalists’ accounts on Telegram clearly side with Russia.
The Burmese language Kye Mon newspaper reminded readers that Ukraine was part of Soviet Union and appeared to draw a link with the situation at home, warning against allowing disintegration of multi-ethnic Myanmar and to prevent outside interference. An editorial last week in the Burmese-language Myanmar Alin also called for building a strong military in order to be respected by neighbors.
But private media have carried international wire services and presented the conflict as the result of a Russian invasion. Anti-junta outlets operating in exile took a largely pro-Ukraine stance.
Cambodia (144/180)
The state news agency Agence Kampuchea Presse, or AKP, has carried brief news about Russian leaders and the sanctions they now face, based on translations from Xinhua and TASS. AKP reports do not portray Russia as the aggressor and do not provide details of death and destruction in Ukraine.
Pro-government Fresh News has focused on sanctions against Russia from the West and Russian reactions.
The pro-government outlet DAP has published articles and news supporting the Russian invasion as an act of self-defense, and blaming the West for provoking the war to enlarge its influence.
Some private outlets are carrying international media reports of the conflict.
Indonesia (113/180)
Most media in Indonesia have relied on international wire services including Agence France-Presse, the Associated Press and Reuters for reporting on the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
One news website RMOL.id posted an interview with the Ukrainian ambassador to Indonesia, Vasyl Hamianin, where he began by saying: “It’s extremely worrying. Russian President Vladimir Putin’s ambition and obsession with invading Ukraine has brought Muslim societies in both countries into conflict.”
During the interview, Hamianin accused Russia of pitting Muslims against each other by sending Chechen fighters to Ukraine.
While Muslims total only about 1 percent of Ukraine’s population, Crimea, which is internationally recognized as part of Ukraine, account for 15 percent of the population.
Indonesia is the world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation.
Malaysia (119/180)
The Malaysian government has refrained from using the word “invasion,” referring to the current situation as “intensifying conflict in Ukraine” while urging the two nations to find peace without specifically naming Russia.
But upcoming local elections in one of Malaysia’s largest states is drawing more attention from local media than what is being called the Russia-Ukraine crisis – where reporting leans pro-Ukraine.
Much of the reporting is focusing on how the crisis has impacted on the Malaysian economy in the form of price hikes for gasoline and other goods.
Bangladesh (152/180)
Ukraine reporting tops the front pages of Bangladesh newspapers while private TV channels host analysts to discuss the Russian invasion and air reports released by global media including BBC, CNN, and Al Jazeera. Overall, the media coverage is balanced while the analysts offer varied opinions, mostly critical of the invasion.
“Bangladesh media is mainly presenting the war facts and casualties, which is not sufficient in wartime reporting, I think. The media should be more reflective of anti-war sentiments and presenting human angle stories,” media analyst Faruq Faisel, regional director for South Asia and Bangladesh of the rights group Article 19, told BenarNews.
Bangladesh media has reported on efforts to return Bangladeshi expatriates who were stuck inside Ukraine or fled into its neighboring countries. Other reporting focused on analysts expressing fear that potential sanctions against Russia could negatively affect construction of the Russian-built Rooppur nuclear power plant, one of the nation’s largest development projects.
The Philippines (138/180)
Philippine media coverage of the conflict in Ukraine has been muted and has dealt with efforts to bring home about 350 Filipino migrant workers.
Stories are playing on foreign news pages as Page One reporting has focused on the May 9 presidential election even as candidates have spoken about Russia and Ukraine.
Of particular concern is how the ongoing invasion would affect the economy because pump prices have gone up.
Thailand 137/180
Thai media’s foreign news sections have been flooded with coverage of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, largely based on reports or analysis from foreign news agencies. Global English news channels, like BBC, CNN, Al Jazeera, Russia’s RT, and China’s CCTV can be watched only on pay TV. Many people get access via YouTube.
Official information is coming out of the Thai Embassy in Warsaw, Poland, which also is responsible for the evacuation of some 255 Thais working in the service sector in Ukraine. Thirty-eight arrived back home on Wednesday.
The Thai government, known for ‘bending with the wind’ on foreign policy, failed to condemn Russia for the invasion. It has been noted and criticized by some in the local media for taking a “neutral” stance, as government officials have avoided the word “invasion,” and largely confined their remarks to the economic fallout, including on gas prices and tourism.
Reporting by RFA’s Khmer, Lao, Mandarin, Myanmar, and Vietnamese Services, and Pimuk Rakkanam, Subel Rai Bhandari, Richel V. Umel, Froilan Gallardo, and Muzliza Mustafa for BenarNews. Written by Paul Eckert.
The latest and largest of series of melees among truck drivers stuck at a key Laos-China border crossing erupted on Wednesday, with two serious injuries and arrests reported in a brawl over line-cutting where hundreds of vehicles waited for days to carry perishable fruit across the border, Lao drivers and police said.
China’s strict border controls under its controversial “zero-COVID” policy to curb coronavirus infections have brought mass congestion and flaring tempers among truckers and traders on its long land borders with Laos, Vietnam and Myanmar. The Southeast Asian truckers say border policies often favor Chinese firms at their expense.
Lao truckers said they had to wait about seven or eight days along Route 13 North to reach the Boten-Bohan international border checkpoint in northern Laos’ Luang Namtha province, bordering China. The traffic congestion has choked landlocked Laos’ exports to China, causing losses as bananas and melons quickly spoil in the tropical heat.
Trucks move according to their placement in line, and those who jump the queue are detained and fined. RFA previously reported that fights frequently break out among Lao and Chinese drivers because some Chinese were paying bribes to Lao traffic police to skip the long lines.
This week’s fighting broke out on the road in Nahom village of Oudomxay province, about 40 kilometers from the Laos-China border, when about a dozen Chinese truck drivers beat a Lao truck driver with wooden sticks, leaving him unconscious. The man was taken to a local hospital where he is still being treated.
Later the same day, a score of Lao drivers chased the Chinese truckers and assaulted, seriously injuring one man, according to a witness and a video clip.
“The cause of the fight is the traffic congestion,” a Lao truck driver who witnessed the fight but declined to be named told RFA on Thursday. “Some truckers skip the line.”
The melee began after a Chinese man, who owned watermelons to be delivered to China, cleared the traffic for his Lao truck driver to reach the border crossing, he said.
“Seeing the watermelon truck pass by, a Chinese truck driver got angry and blocked the road with his motorcycle,” the Lao trucker said. “The Lao driver didn’t stop, and hit the motorcycle. The Chinese driver got angrier then hit the Lao driver.”
About 10 other Chinese drivers joined in the assault on the Lao man, he said. Afterwards, as the Chinese advanced to the border gate, a group of Lao truckers blocked and attacked them.
“The fistfight became a large melee,” said the Lao trucker. “One of the Chinese was also badly injured and laid down unconscious in front of the warehouse and the border gate.”
An official at the Chinese Embassy in Vientiane said that the embassy had not received any reports on the incident.
‘Officers went down the line’
Latsavang Pachittham, head of Luang Namtha’s traffic department, said traffic officers saw the truck driven by a Lao man pass other trucks and ordered him to pull over at a gas station.
“Then our officers went down the line to deal with some other traffic problems,” he said on a video clip published Friday by Lao Phattana Daily News. “Suddenly, the Lao truck sped away, passing other trucks.”
When the Chinese man on a motorcycle rode past the truck then blocked the road, the Lao truck driver stopped and got out with a knife in hand, said Letsavang.
“The Chinese attacked him,” he said. “The Chinese called his company, and then the company workers came in a pickup truck to help him beat the Lao man. They along with the Chinese driver advanced to the Boten border gate. Just before the border gate, the friends of the injured Lao guy attacked the Chinese.”
Another Lao trucker, who saw the incident, confirmed the details of the fighting.
“The two drivers had a heated argument, and then the Chinese clubbed the Lao man until he was seriously injured,” said the driver who declined to give his name.
“The Lao guy was injured more seriously than the Chinese one was because the Chinese used two wooden sticks to beat up the Laotian,” he added. “A few Lao police officers were there watching and doing nothing.”
This second Lao driver said the trucks, many of which are transporting watermelons and bananas, must wait in a 40-50 kilometers (25-31 miles) long line along the Route 13 North.
The third Lao trucker told RFA that Lao police tried to stop the violence, but they could not because they were outnumbered, with up to 20 Laotians at the border gate beating about 10 Chinese.
He said that on Thursday, he saw a handful of people involved in the melee being handcuffed.
“I heard that these arrested fighters will be charged according the law,” the driver said.
Reported by RFA’s Lao Service. Translated by Max Avary. Wrtitten in English by Roseanne Gerin.
The junta that overthrew Myanmar’s elected government on Feb. 1, 2021 has used helicopter gunships and fighter jets to terrorize areas that have opposed military rule. The military has also resorted to torching villages it suspects of supporting resistance to the junta. The tactic, used for decades in ethnic conflicts, has landed Myanmar in the International Court of Justice to face crimes against humanity charges for a 2017 scorched-earth campaign to expel Rohingya Muslims. Arsonists from the army and allied militias burned more than 6,100 houses across the Southeast Asian country in the year to March 1, according to the research group Data for Myanmar.
Leaders of the four member states of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, or Quad, said after a snap meeting that a major conflict like in Ukraine should not be allowed to happen in the Indo-Pacific.
The leaders of the United States, Australia, India and Japan met virtually late on Thursday to discuss the Russia-Ukraine war and its possible impact.
The Japanese Prime Minister, Fumio Kishida, said after the meeting that “unilateral changes to the status quo by force or coercion like the recent Russian aggression against Ukraine are also unacceptable in the Indo-Pacific region.”
In his statement, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said: ”We cannot allow what is happening in Ukraine now to ever happen in the Indo-Pacific.”
“We are resolute in our commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific region where smaller states do not need to live in fear of more powerful ones.”
A joint readout of the Quad leaders call said the meeting was “to reaffirm their commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific, in which the sovereignty and territorial integrity of all states is respected and countries are free from military, economic, and political coercion.”
It also said the leaders “agreed to stand up a new humanitarian assistance and disaster relief mechanism which will enable the Quad to meet future humanitarian challenges in the Indo-Pacific,” as well as to respond to the crisis in Ukraine.
The four leaders will meet in person “in Tokyo in the coming months,” the readout said. Japanese sources say it may be in May.
Former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, left, and Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen, center, walk together during a meeting at the Presidential Office in Taipei, Taiwan, March 3, 2022. Credit: Taiwan Presidential Office via AP
Persuading India
The summit was convened at U.S. President Joe Biden’s request, reportedly after India abstained on a U.N. resolution condemning Russia’s aggression in Ukraine.
The resolution was adopted on Wednesday at a rare emergency session of the U.N. General Assembly with 141 of the U.N.’s 193 members voting in its favor. India was among 35 countries that abstained, together with China and South Africa. India has a strong, long-standing relationship with Russia, especially in the defense sector.
Washington had been making efforts to persuade Delhi to take a clear stance in opposing Russia’s aggression in Ukraine, Donald Lu, U.S. assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asia, told a Senate subcommittee hearing on Wednesday.
In response, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said after the Quad summit that the leaders “reaffirmed our shared commitment to ensuring security, safety and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific.”
Modi “underlined that the Quad must remain focused on its core objective of promoting peace, stability and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific region,” according to his office.
The Indian prime minister also emphasized the “need to return to a path of dialogue and diplomacy” in relation to developments in Ukraine.
Taiwan issue
As the war is ravaging Eastern Europe, there are concerns that China would feel emboldened to make a move on Taiwan which it considers a breakaway province and repeatedly vows to reunite with the mainland.
Experts say Beijing is watching the Ukrainian developments closely before making any decision in regards to Taiwan.
On Friday, when asked about a possibility that China would use force against the self-governing island amid the Ukrainian war, former U.S. secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, said: “I don’t think we know how [Chinese leader] Xi jinping will interpret what’s taking place in Ukraine today.”
Pompeo, on his first ever visit to Taiwan, warned that “losing Taiwan would directly imperil our vital national interest in the United States.”
The former top U.S. diplomat said that the U.S. should change its 50-year strategic ambiguity on Taiwan and “immediately take necessary and long overdue steps to do the right and obvious thing which is to offer the Republic of China (Taiwan) America’s diplomatic recognition as a free and sovereign country.”
The call was met with angry response from Beijing. China Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin on Friday said: “Mike Pompeo is a former politician with bankrupt credibility, and his nonsense is doomed to failure.”
On Thursday, Wang called Pompeo’s meeting with the Taiwanese leader Tsai Ing-wen a “simply shameless and futile” act.
Pompeo served as secretary of state during the Trump administration.
