Dharamshala: Tseten Dolkar of the Tibetan Service of Radio Free Asia (RFA) was honoured with the 2009 David Burke Distinguished Journalism Award for her outstanding reporting during 10 months of 2008 covering the peaceful Tibetan protests.

Dolkar, a member of Radio Free Asia’s Tibetan service, received the award at a ceremony held by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) in the Cohen Building in Washington on Wednesday, 3 June.

Named after former BBG Chairman David Burke, the award recognizes courage, integrity and originality in reporting by journalists within the BBG broadcast organizations.

“She helped cover the earliest stories of Tibetan unrest due to the Tibetan peoples’ trust in her objectivity, as she employed multiple sources, including the Chinese police, and triple-checked her stories before broadcasting,” said BBG Governor Blanquita Cullum.

“We are proud of Tseten Dolkar, who is deserving of this wonderful honor and high praise, as is the staff of Radio Free Asia’s Tibetan service, for their tireless work in breaking this story,” RFA’s website quoted Libby Liu, President of Radio Free Asia as saying.

“We thank the Broadcasting Board of Governors for recognizing the solid journalism that went into covering the Chinese crackdown on Tibetan protesters in March last year and will continue to inform RFA’s listeners of the news happening around them,” Libby Liu added.

Another winners of this year’s award are: Luis Ramirez of Voice of America (VOA), the Afghanistan-based correspondents of RFE/RL’s Afghan Service, the radio news department of the Office of Cuba Broadcasting (OCB), and Serwa Abdel Wahed and Akram Alrubaiei of the Middle East Broadcasting Networks’ Alhurra TV.

The Broadcasting Board of Governors is an independent federal agency which supervises all U.S. government-supported, civilian international broadcasting, including the Voice of America (VOA); Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL); the Middle East Broadcasting Networks (Alhurra TV and Radio Sawa); Radio Free Asia (RFA); and the Office of Cuba Broadcasting (Radio and TV Marti). Through its broadcast services, the BBG provides the United States and its leaders direct and immediate access to a worldwide audience of 155 million people.

Dharamshala: Marking the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square Massacre on Thursday (4 June), US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi joined fellow members of the US Congress and human rights activists to express their commitment to work until freedom and openness prevails in China and in Tibet.

China’s right activist Yang Jianli and the Initiatives for China organised the gathering at the US Capitol Hill.

“Words fail me to adequately tell you what an honor it is to be on the same stage and in the presence of so many of the heroes of June 4 – to have a message at the same time from His Holiness the Dalai Lama in solidarity for more openness in China and Tibet.

His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s statement in Chinese and English languages were read out on the occasion.

Addressing the gathering, Speaker Pelosi said: “We stand here in front of the Capitol of the United States, a beacon of freedom to the world, with a great history of free speech and open discussion.

“On this side of the Capitol, here on these grounds, we stand with people who took to heart and to mind, the words of our Founders. In our Declaration of Independence, in our Constitution, our words talked about every person being equal and ‘endowed by their creator.” ‘Endowed by their creator,’ not by the state, but ‘endowed by their creator’ of certain rights like liberty and the pursuit of happiness. And it was for life and liberty – and some people paid that price in Tiananmen Square. They paid with their lives and their liberty to speak out for freedom.

“It’s interesting to me that this week there are also observances in Eastern Europe about freedom emerging there at this time 20 years ago. And for those of you who are old enough to remember Tiananmen Square, you would have seen that the students gathered in the square in May in the days leading up to June 4th were an inspiration to the world, to the entire world. They inspired others to have the courage and they had a drumbeat of liberty and freedom that was felt around the world.

“What they wanted was dialogue with their government on openness and freedom and freedom of speech and religion and ending the corruption in China. They wanted that dialogue, they wanted that conversation – what they got was crushed. Crushed. Some of those people crushed in the square and other streets of Beijing. But they could not crush the spirit of Tiananmen.

“And that’s why it’s important these 20 years later – I remember meeting Chai Ling in Paris. She was newly escaped from China – we are so proud of her, she is so courageous, and so many others, so many other heroes of that movement. Many of them, when they got out of China, signed my man before the tank poster in my office, which is getting old now, but I’m very proud of the signatures that are on there. They are the signatures to a declaration of freedom in China and what this freedom means is openness, freedom of speech, freedom of religion, accountability, rule of law according to the Chinese Constitution.

“So what is important for us to do now? Who would have ever thought all of you here who are gathered with great leaders for democracy? Who would have ever thought that 20 years later, we would still be in this situation? That the same cowardice that inspired – I don’t know if inspired is the word – that insisted that the regime crush the people in the square – to clear that square at such and such a time. The same cowardice that did that – that same fear of the people exists in China today.

“We were told 20 years ago that peaceful evolution and economic reform would lead to political reform. Indeed, the economic reform has occurred. And I was so pleased that Secretary Clinton said in a statement that China has made enormous progress economically. I saw that last week in China. But she also said that a China that had made all that progress should examine openly the darker events of its past and provide a public accounting of those killed at Tiananmen Square – both to learn and to heal. We need to do that as we go forward.

“I have said over and over again: if we do not support human rights in China and in Tibet, we lose all moral authority to speak about human rights any place in the world. So here we are in front of the Capitol, a building symbolic of the core values of our American independence and our
Constitution, in solidarity with those who, using our words, modeling the Goddess of Democracy after the Statue of Liberty, having those aspirations – people carrying those aspirations crushed in Tiananmen Square.

“Twenty years later, the spirit is still alive. In Hong Kong in the observance of Tiananmen Square, over 150,000 people turned out last night. 150,000 people – the biggest crowd since the one-year anniversary of Tiananmen Square. So I know that the long arm of the Chinese government will be reaching out to the media all over the world to suppress reporting on what’s happened in China, and also restricting communication from China through the Internet and the rest, but the fact is that here we are at the Capitol, there they were in Hong Kong, a drumbeat of activity across the world, an echo of the voices of the heroes of Tiananmen. We will never forget. We want a record of what happened, and we will continue to work for more openness and improvements in human rights in China and Tibet.

“Thank you for your courage to turn out here today, to stand in front of the Capitol, to hold us accountable to our own values, and to continue to work together to remember the Tiananmen Square Massacre, to get a public accounting of it.

“So our work is large. It’s work that many of us have been involved in for 20 years. In 1991, I stood in the square and unfurled a banner remembering those who sacrificed so much in Tiananmen Square. I wear white today to signal to the families a sympathy for what they have lost. I did that in 1991 as a Member of Congress, an individual Member, to express my views and the views of my constituents. It was a bipartisan group of us on the square that day, Democrats and Republicans.

“Eighteen years later as Speaker of the House, I had the opportunity to sit across from the President of China, the Premier of China, the Chairman of the People’s Congress, and to express to them the bipartisan concern in the Congress of the United States about China’s human rights record both in China and in Tibet.

“Whatever our roles in whatever stage of our involvement, we have to use everything at our disposal so that they know that we have not forgotten, and that we will not rest until there is freedom of speech and expression and assembly and openness in China and in Tibet.”

Reykjavik, 1 June: The most prominent Church here, called Hallgrimskirkja, was today packed to capacity with 1200 people as they came to hear His Holiness the Dalai Lama on his first ever visit to Iceland. Many people were also seen standing on the sides of the church hall with all seats being filled and many others unable to fit in waited outside to have a glimpse of His Holiness as he made his way out.

The Tibetan Nobel Peace laureate was invited by the Bishop of Iceland, His Grace Karl Sigurbjornsson, to address the special inter-faith gathering of “peace and prayer” held in the Church located in downtown area of the country’s capital Reykjavik. This public inter-faith event attended by representatives of various religious and faiths such as Islam, the Catholic Church of Iceland, the Bahai Community of Iceland, the Russian Orthodox Church of Iceland, etc., was organised especially to coincide with His Holiness’ June 1-3 visit to Iceland.

His Holiness being welcomed by the Bishop of Iceland at the special inter-faith gathering. Photo by Ragnar Axelsson

Bishop Sigurbjornsson in welcoming His Holiness spoke about the Tibetan leader’s untiring witness to peace and hope.

“The suffering of your people and country, Tibet, from which you had to flee fifty years ago, has touched a deep cord in our hearts. We Icelanders are a small nation cherishing our freedom and we can identify with the pain of oppression. In a world of escalating violence, hate and retaliation your witness to the way of peace, compassion and reconciliation has been beacon for us all,” the Bishop said.

The Church leader further said that they wanted to pay their respect and gratitude to His Holiness for “your work for understanding, tolerance and love between peoples, nations and
religions”, adding, “That is a message our world needs to hear and take to heart.”

Speaking on the occasion, His Holiness said that on his first visit to Iceland he was pleased that his first public engagement was an inter-faith event that was keeping in tune with one of his main commitments of promoting inter-religious harmony.

Commenting on the topic of “Peace and Hope”, His Holiness told the large gathering that it was good to base our life on hope because no one can predict the future. He said if a person lost hope then sometimes they commit suicide and this is why it is much better to remain hopeful and follow the path of peace and non-violence.

“Only through cultivation of inner peace can we attain lasting and long-term peace in the world. All the religions and faith have the same potential to promote peace,” His Holiness said, adding that “Religion must be the method to solve problems and not create problems”.

Thorhalla Bjornsdottir, head of the Organising Committee of the “Dalai Lama in Iceland” group, at whose initial invitation His Holiness was visiting Iceland, said that the visit of His Holiness, who arrived here last night from Copenhagen, Denmark, has had a positive impact on the people here.

“His Holiness has reached out to many people in the country. One percent of the people in Iceland have bought a ticket to attend his sold-out public talk on Tuesday. It seems he has opened the heart of everyone and given hope at this critical time the people of Iceland are facing”, she said.

Iceland is a small country inhabited by 300,000 people and the country is still in the grip of the major economic crisis. Many here believe that His Holiness’ visit could not have come at a better time to give a sense of hope to the people and the wisdom that money alone cannot bring about happiness. It is apparently with this in mind that the organisers of His Holiness’ public talk tomorrow has suggested “Compassion, Value and Happiness” as the topic for the public talk.

His Holiness’ remarks at the inter-faith gathering in the Church received a positive response from all sections of the people. As the Bishop and other religious and faith leaders were leading His Holiness to his motorcade waiting outside the Church, a lady walked up to say, “Thank you for coming to Iceland and for opening everyone’s hearts”. Many people with smiles on their faces and some whose eyes were filled with tears of joy had also assembled
outside the church to greet and wave at His Holiness.

Earlier in the morning, His Holiness gave an audience to the Ambassador of India and members of the visit Organising Committee and volunteers. He also gave an interview to Iceland’s oldest newspaper Morgunbladid and addressed a “meeting with the press” where he answered questions ranging from the Tibet issue to his impression about Iceland, which he said, like Tibet, enjoyed a clear blue sky.

Tomorrow, His Holiness will be visiting the Parliament of Iceland at the invitation of the Parliament Speaker, Mrs. Asta Ragnheidur, to address members of the Committee on Foreign Affairs. He will also be visiting the University of Iceland to participate in an educational seminar with top academics especially in the field of philosophy and religious studies. Among others, Iceland’s Minister of Environment and Minister of Health are also scheduled to
separately call on His Holiness.

“The facts that government ministers and other political leaders are approaching us for meeting with His Holiness clearly show their regard for the warm public mood and positive response to His Holiness’ visit to Iceland”, said Mr. Tsering Tashi, the London- based Representative of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, responsible for coordinating the Iceland visit and who is accompanying the Tibetan leader on the Denmark and Iceland leg of the current four country visit.

His Holiness’ visit is also receiving good coverage in Iceland’s TV channels and newspapers.

-Report filed by the Office of Tibet, London

Copenhagen: His Holiness the Dalai Lama arrived here Friday afternoon and straight away proceeded in a motorcade, escorted by five Danish police motorcyclists, to first meet Danish Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen and later Foreign Minister Per Stig Møller.

His Holiness thanked Prime Minister Rasmussen for meeting him on the first day of his visit to Denmark that is taking place primarily at the invitations to give teachings and a public talk on “Peace Through Inner Peace.”

His Holiness said that all his trips abroad are spiritual and educational in nature and that in this connection he tries to fulfil his two main commitments of promoting warm-heartedness as a member of the same human family and inter-religious harmony as a religious practitioner.

The prime minister said that he was pleased to meet with His Holiness and that although there are not many Buddhists in Denmark, many Danish people admire and have great respect for His Holiness.

He said Denmark supports human rights for the Tibetan people and said as His Holiness will later be meeting the Foreign Minister, they should discuss the situation in Tibet. His Holiness was accompanied at this meeting by his Secretary Mr. Tenzin Taklha and London-based Representative Mr. Tsering Tashi.

Later on His Holiness met the foreign minister of Denmark. The meeting focused mainly on the Tibet situation.

Tomorrow morning His Holiness will be meeting the press. In view of the number of requests that the Office of Tibet, London, has been receiving for one to one interviews and the inability to help with all the requests because of time constraints, the ‘Meeting with the Press’ opportunity has been arranged so that the maximum number of media representatives have the opportunity to meet and ask questions to His Holiness the Dalai Lama. As of going to the press, 74 journalists have registered to attend the meeting, thus showing the huge level of media interest in His Holiness’ visit to Denmark.

Upon arrival at the hotel, His Holiness was welcomed by representatives of the hotel management, Tibetans dressed in traditional dress and Danish supporters and well-wishers.

This is His Holiness’ eighth visit to Denmark. The first time His Holiness visited this Scandinavian nation was in 1973.

–Report filed by the Office of Tibet, London

Dharamshala: US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi and a bipartisan congressional delegation took up the issue of human rights situation in Tibet during their meetings with three top leaders of the Chinese government: President Hu Jintao, Premier Wen Jiabao, and Wu Bangguo, the Chairman of the National People’s Congress.

“Our delegation also emphasized the bipartisan concern in Congress on China’s poor record on human rights in China and Tibet,” Pelosi said after meeting with the Chinese leadership in Beijing on Thursday.

“Republicans and Democrats are united in our concern about human rights abuses in China and Tibet,” said Congressman James Sensenbrenner, Republican of Wisconsin.

Earlier in the day, the congressional delegation participated in a two-hour working session with the Chinese National People’s Congress’ Environmental Protection and Resources Conservation Committee.

In addition to Pelosi, Sensenbrenner, and Markey, the other members of the congressional delegation traveling to China this week, all experts on issues related to clean energy and the environment, are Congressman Earl Blumenauer, Democrat of Oregon; Congressman Jay Inslee, Democrat of Washington state; and Congresswoman Jackie Speier, Democrat of California.

“We had productive discussions about how the United States and China can cooperate on improving international security, growing our economies and protecting the environment,” Pelosi said. “We urged the Chinese leaders to use their influence to help bring North Korea to the table for Six- Party Talks. On clean energy and climate change, both sides agreed to work together to confront the urgent challenge we face. “

Last year in April, Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the members of US Congressional delegation introduced House Resolution calling on the Government of the People’s Republic of China to end its crackdown on nonviolent Tibetan protestors and its continuing cultural, religious, economic, and linguistic repression inside Tibet.

Following the Chinese government’s crackdown on Tibetan protesters in Tibet in March 2008, the US Congressional delegation, headed by speaker Pelosi, visited Dharamsala to express their concern and solidarity with the Tibetan people.

The resolution calls on the Chinese Government to begin a results-based dialogue, without preconditions, directly with His Holiness the Dalai Lama to address the legitimate grievances of the Tibetan people and provide for a long-term solution that respects the human rights and dignity of every Tibetan.

It calls on the Chinese Government to allow independent international monitors and journalists, free and unfettered access to the Tibet Autonomous Region and all other Tibetan areas of China for the purpose of monitoring and documenting events surrounding the Tibetan protests and to verify that individuals injured receive adequate medical care.

It further calls on the Chinese Government to immediately release all Tibetans who are imprisoned for nonviolently expressing opposition to Chinese Government policies in Tibet.

Unsung Heroes of Compassion - Thuten Kesang

Mr. Thuten Kesang is the first Tibetan to arrive and settled in New Zealand in 1967. Since then he is passionate about helping his fellow Tibetan refugees. For him, in fact, it is a moral imperative. Equally important, however, is that aiding others is his way of returning a stranger’s long-ago kindness.

Eager to see him well educated, Thuten’s parents sent him at age of eleven from his home in Lhasa Tibet, to board at Dr Graham’s Homes, a school in Kalimpong, India. One of India’s finest schools, Dr. Graham’s Homes was established in 1900 to educate, Anglo-Indian children, and Thuten was one of the few Tibetan children enrolled. Four years later, however, he learned that his parents had been arrested in the 1959 Chinese occupation of Tibet and that he had become a refugee. With no money to pay tuition and no family to return home to, Thuten’s prospect looked dire. Then, one day, he met Robert Crow, a Scottish board member of Dr. Graham’s Homes who lived in India and offered to pay Thuten’s tuition and boarding fees. “That precise moment,” Thuten says, “I decided that I would do my best to repay his kindness by helping others in need when I was in a position to do so.”

In Time, Thuten learned that his mother had starved to death in Tibet, and his father had perished in Chinese prison. “What happened to my parents was terrible, but not unique,” Thuten says. “I will never forget the kindness shown to me by Robert Crow at that time.”

Crow helped Thuten again in 1962, this time securing him a position as a printer’s apprentice in Calcutta, India, and supporting him for three years while he learned a trade. Today, Thuten owns his own printing business in Auckland, New Zealand, where he works to fulfil his promise to return the generosity he received as a child. “I have never hesitated to help someone in need,” he says adding that he expects nothing in return.

Thuten’s first opportunity to give back came when he learned that young refugee living at the Tibetan Children’s Village in Dharamsala, India, a school established in 1960 by His Holiness the Dalai Lama and his sister Tsering Dolma Takla, needed financial support. Thuten offered to sponsor a child, and soon thereafter became treasurer of the Tibetan Children Relief Society of New Zealand, a grass-root organization dedicated to raising funds to sponsor children at Tibetan Children’s Village. “The first orphan I sponsored went on to receive his doctorate in medicine,” Thuten says, noting that the former orphan is now a physician in India. Today the Tibetan Children Relief Society sponsors the education of four hundred and fifty students at two schools in India, and Thuten recently marked his forty-second year as treasurer.

Thuten also serves as the honorary secretary and treasurer of Dr. Graham’s Homes New Zealand committee, an international committee established to match individual children at Thuten’s alma mater with financial sponsors in New Zealand. It is important to Thuten that in addition to providing money for student’s education, each sponsor corresponds with the child he supports. “I know from personal experience how much it means to meet the person blessing you with his generosity,” he says.

Inspired by a passion to help and an awareness that the need for aid to Tibetan children far surpasses available resources, Thuten founded and became the national chairman of Friends of Tibet (New Zealand), an organization that educates New Zealanders about the plight of the Tibetans raises funds to educate exiled Tibetans children in India, and provides support to ex-political prisoners who have escaped from Tibet to India. He has also served as president of the Auckland Multicultural Society.

The diaspora and hardship of people sadden Thuten but they also inspire him to do even more. “I don’t dwell on the bad, “he says. “ I look at the bright side of life and get on with it, the important thing is to have a good heart.”

On 26 April in California His Holiness the Dalai Lama presented 49 individuals from 13 countries with an “Unsung Hero of Compassion” award. Dorjee Dadul, a long-term resident of Sydney’s Northern Beaches, was among the recipients.

Dorjee has been recognised twice by the Australian Government for his contribution to the Sydney’s Tibetan community and to the broader Australian community: In 2007 he was named Warringah Council’s Citizen of the Year. Also that year he received the Most Commended Volunteer Award from the New South Wales Community Relations Commission.

“These individuals have been selected as representatives of the tens of thousands of people worldwide who quietly serve the disenfranchised and work to improve our communities through their personal efforts,” said Dick Grace, Chair of Wisdom in Action, who hosted the celebration. “We don’t see them or hear about them in the daily news, but they exemplify a humanism and heroism to which we must each aspire.”

Among other things, Dorjee has worked tirelessly both to preserve Tibetan culture within Australia’s exiled Tibetan community and to promote Tibetan culture to the wider Australian community. Dorjee teaches Tibetan language, culture and customs to young Tibetans as well as running Tibetan language classes for Australians.

The Unsung Hero of Compassion award was also presented to Thuten Kesang, President of the New Zealand Tibetan community. Thuten recently spent his Easter break in Dee Why on Sydney’s Northern Beaches, at the fourth annual gathering of Tibetans from Australia and New Zealand.

The other recipients, 25 women and 24 men, ranged in age from 12 to 77 and came from a variety of ethnicities, cultures and religious backgrounds.

Open Forum is a platform for those interested in the issue of Tibet to air their views. It is a discussion forum that we hope will make our readers come to a more informed understanding of Tibet and the Tibetan people. Views expressed in Open Forum do not reflect those of the Central Tibetan Administration.

[The Boston Globe]

5 May 2009

IN A MEETING at the Charles Hotel in Cambridge last week, the Dalai Lama and more than 100 scholars from China showed how direct discussion can overcome irrational prejudices and official cant. Chinese academics needed a chance to encounter Tibet’s spiritual leader without government interference.

The organizer of the event, Lobsang Sangay, a senior fellow at Harvard Law School, set out the simplest of ground rules: civil discourse and no photographs taken until after the discussion. Moderator Tu Weiming, professor of Chinese history and philosophy and Confucian studies at Harvard, urged all sides to allow a genuine exchange of ideas, celebrate their differences, and refrain from trying to convert others.

But the participants hardly needed coaching. The Chinese scholars were respectful and open-minded, often acknowledging false impressions they had originally held about Tibetans, the history of Tibetan-Chinese relations, and the role of the Dalai Lama. For his part, the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhists seemed to surprise many of the younger Chinese academics as he described the three- and four-hour audiences he had with Chairman Mao Zedong in Beijing more than a half century ago.

Some in the audience were amused when the Dalai Lama said he had once been attracted to the moral principles of socialism, particularly its ideal of equal distribution, and had even asked to join the Chinese Communist Party. There were no challenges and no raised eyebrows, however, when he said that today there is a ruling Communist Party in China without communist ideology.

Free from official mediation, the academics heard the Dalai Lama say that he welcomes the material progress China had brought Tibet – but also that his people were suffering nonetheless because they lacked freedom of expression, religious freedom, and freedom from fear.

Drawing a distinction between autonomy for Tibet and political independence, he explained the request his envoys made to Chinese officials last summer, shortly after the violent clashes on the Tibetan plateau in March 2008. He said they had asked only for forms of autonomy consistent with those promised to national minorities in China’s constitution – especially the right to preserve Tibetan language, culture, and religion. Yet Chinese officials falsely accused him of demanding independence for Tibet, calling him a liar and a demon.

The Chinese scholars who crowded around him afterward, snapping photos of themselves with the Dalai Lama, now know he is nothing like the figure depicted in Beijing’s propaganda.

–The above piece is reproduced from the online edition of The Boston Globe on 5 May 2009.

Open Forum is a platform for those interested in the issue of Tibet to air their views. It is a discussion forum that we hope will make our readers come to a more informed understanding of Tibet and the Tibetan people. Views expressed in Open Forum do not reflect those of the Central Tibetan Administration.

By Li Datong*

Beijing’s official doctrine and the political system built around it conspire to freeze progress on the Tibet issue, says Li Datong.

[openDemocracy.net]

(This article was first published on 16 April 2009)

China’s Tibet has been given a new holiday to mark the passing of a half-century since the events it commemorates: Serfs’ Emancipation Day. Several groups of senior politicians, including Hu Jintao – general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party’s central committee – have attended an exhibition marking these fifty years of democratic reform in Tibet. The official media have decried the evils of”serfdom” in historical Tibet, while trumpeting the accomplishments of today. China’s foreign minister and prime minister have presented criticisms of the Dalai Lama’s “independence stance” (one he has long since renounced) to reporters both foreign and domestic. Read the rest…