More Suicides Reported in Protest of
Destruction at Sichuan's Larung Gar
2016-08-29 Radio Free
Asia Kunsang
Tenzin, Karma
Dorjee, Richard Finney
Two more Buddhist nuns living at
Sichuan’s Larung Gar Academy have killed themselves following a
suicide in July to protest Chinese authorities’ destruction of
large parts of the Tibetan Buddhist study center, with the
attempted suicide of yet another woman blocked by friends at the
last minute, according to Tibetan sources.
Tsering Dolma, aged about 20, hanged herself on Aug. 17 “when she
could no longer bear the pain of seeing the destruction of Larung
Gar,” a source living in the area told RFA’s Tibetan Service. “She
left behind a note expressing her distress at the demolition and
complaining that the Chinese will not let them live in
peace.”
A native of Mewa township in Marthang (in Chinese, Hongyuan) county
in Sichuan’s Ngaba (Aba) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Dolma had
been seen before her death to be “depressed and worried” over
Chinese authorities’ destruction of thousands of dwellings at the
academy, RFA’s source said, speaking on condition of
anonymity.
“So she hanged herself,” he said.
A nun named Semga, a native of Dowa village in Ngaba’s Dzamthang
(Rangtang) county, is also believed to have recently killed
herself, though details on how and when she died were not
immediately available, while a third nun attempted suicide “though
others intervened in time and saved her,” the source said.
The deaths follow the suicide on July 20 of Rinzin Dolma, a nun who
hanged herself as Chinese work crews began to tear down monks’ and
nuns’ houses to reduce what authorities have described as
overcrowding at the Larung Gar academy in Ngaba's Serthar (Seda)
county, sources said in earlier reports.
Many thousands of Tibetans and Han Chinese study at the sprawling
Larung Gar complex, which was founded in 1980 by the late religious
teacher Khenpo Jigme Phuntsok and is one of the world’s largest and
most important centers for the study of Tibetan Buddhism.
Orders from higher-up
The order now to reduce the number of Larung Gar’s residents by
about half to a maximum level of 5,000 is not a county plan “but
comes from higher authorities,” with China’s president Xi Jinping
taking a personal interest in the matter, sources told RFA in
earlier reports.
Chinese authorities have stationed armed security forces at the
work site and are warning that attempts at protest or resistance
will be punished by arrests and incarceration, one source said,
adding that armed police have also been deployed to nearby
areas.
Informed by her friends of Dolma’s death, officials of Larung Gar’s
government-appointed management committee said at first that they
were unwilling to look into the case, but later came to try to
claim the body, RFA’s source said.
“They said that their duty according to official instructions was
to be sure that the demolition goes ahead, though, and that they
would not be held responsible for anyone’s death."
Hearing this, the nuns “wailed in grief,” he said.
Rights groups have slammed the government-ordered destruction at
Larung Gar, with New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) saying
that Beijing should allow the Tibetan people to decide for
themselves how best to practice their religion.
"If authorities somehow believe that the Larung Gar facilities are
overcrowded, the answer is simple," HRW China director Sophie
Richardson said in a statement in June.
"Allow Tibetans and other Buddhists to build more
monasteries."