Brief in pdf.

Email: larbour@ohchr.org - ccanessa@ohchr.org -  tb-petitions@ohchr.org
Fax: +41 22 917 9022

Appeal to hold a special session of the Human Rights Council and to put pressure on the Chinese government to admit a fact-finding mission to all Tibetan areas in the People’s Republic of China.

Dear Madam,

In Tibet a large-scale genocide is taking place, whilst China is trying to wipe out all evidence and keep the international community ignorant of the happenings in Tibet.

Various facts and figures given by the different sources have been meticulously examined and tallied with each other. After having done this, is can be confirmed that up to 25 April the actual figure for the number of dead is 203, the number of injured is more than 1,000 and the number of those still detained is more than 5,715. These are figures for Tibetans who died, are injured and still in detention throughout Tibet as of today.

Thirty Tibetans, including six monks, were sentenced in Lhasa on 29 April to imprisonment ranging from three years to life during a one-day show trial at the Intermediate People's Court of Lhasa. They are the first Tibetans sentenced for taking part in the protests which began in Tibet on 10 March. A monk, Pasang (Chinese: Basang), Sonam Tsering, a driver, and 30-year-old businessman, identified only as Tsering, were all sentenced to life. Two other monks were sentenced to 20 years and three others to 15 years.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on 30 April that contrary to Chinese claims the trials were not open and public and were based on secret evidence. According to HRW, the sentenced Tibetans were also denied their own lawyers. The Chinese lawyers who had offered to defend them were threatened by the authorities in Beijing and were forced to withdraw, demonstrating the lack of fair trial standards. Observers regularly find Chinese criminal procedural law to be ineffective and abusive of the right to fair trial and particularly the right to appeal.

We are outraged by these bogus trials and the harshness of the sentences handed down. We are also is extremely concerned about the thousands of Tibetans who have been arrested since the protests began. Any prison sentence can amount to a death sentence in Tibet where torture of political prisoners is well documented.

We express our dismay at the unfair trials and our concern for the thousands of Tibetans arbitrarily detained throughout Tibet who are awaiting such trials.

We therefore demand an investigation into the standards of evidence used, access to the sentenced prisoners to ascertain whether they were tortured in detention, and the inclusion of international observers at appeals, which should be provided to all in accordance to international procedures.

The Chinese armed forces in their attempt to wipe out any kind of evidence related to the recent protests in Tibet are burning all the dead bodies of people who have been killed since the March 14 protest in Tibet. This is a terrible offence to the relatives who are not even able to perform their Buddhist rituals for the deceased. On 28th March, around 83 corpses were burnt altogether in an electrical crematorium, which was built by the Chinese government a few years back in Toelung Dechen county under Lhasa Municipality.

Moreover, some eyewitness accounts confirmed that on March 17, dead bodies were seen in two army trucks near a petrol pump located towards the west of Lhasa. Due to a heavy traffic jam around this petrol pump, a few Tibetans reported having seen blood discharges from the two trucks that were carrying dead bodies. In addition to this, there are more reports of dead bodies being transported to Toelung Dechen County in army trucks.

Many Tibetans who have been injured since the start of the protests in Tibet continue to die in People’s Hospital with no immediate medical care. We received an eye witness report from a Tibetan man who was imprisoned in Lhasa during the protest that all prisoners were bound with ropes and thrown on to the floor of cells.The prisoners were further weakened by the lengthy denial of food.  

The director of the Tibetan Refugee Centre in Dharamsala wrote the following on 29 April:

“At present we have only 17 new arrival refugees at the centre. Since 10 March 2008 we are not receiving the new refugees from Tibet because of following reasons:

1) The Chinese Government has deployed lots of arm force on the Nepal and Tibet border and also into Nepal to stop all the borders and to have special observation on the new refugees.

2) Even in Tibet itself no Tibetan is allow to move from one village to another.

3) In Tibet the Chinese official frequently visit to the Tibetan people's house to check the family member's record.

The situation inside Tibet becomes very critical at the moment, according to the information we are getting from Tibet the Chinese government has stop supplying food and water to the monasteries and all the monasteries are surrounded by arm force with guns and tanks. Besides that monks are facing heavy tortured by the Chinese police.

Those Tibetan who been arrested for doing peaceful demonstration against the Chinese rule have been taken away to the remote place around Chinese border and put in the mud cave (where brick materials are taking out) in a very congested way and they couldn't even find a space to sit. In the beginning they were provided with very salty rice porridge and make them feel very thirsty. Later they have been stop providing any food and water, and then Chinese authorities told the Tibetan prisoner that now you can die according to your choice. Many are dying without food and water and heard they are drinking their own urine out of thirsty.

One group of Tibetan prisoners are imprisoned in the remote desert area. It’s a very sad moment for our Tibet.”

Judging from the information available to us regarding the scale of the ongoing human rights violations against the Tibetan people, it is imperative that the Human Rights Council as the principal human rights organ of the United Nations take urgent measures by convening a special session to address the current situation in China.

We therefore call upon the UN Human Rights Council to hold a Special Session on the current human rights situation in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) and the Tibetan Autonomous Prefectures in the Chinese provinces of Qinghai, Gansu, Sichuan and Yunnan.

China must re-admit foreign press immediately who should have freedom to move about without minders and censorship, China has to keep the promise it made to allow foreign journalists free movement around the whole of China in the run-up to the Olympics. China must cease the present crackdown, release all those detained and provide names of all those detained.

Please refer to the following sites to learn more about the present situation in Tibet: www.tibet.net, www.stoptibetcrisis.net, www.tchrd.org, www.phayul.com.

Thank you very much for your attention to this extremely urgent appeal.

Yours sincerely,

Brief an Wu Hailong

Brief an den chinesichen Botschafter in Berlin

Übersetzung des Briefes

Brief an die chinesische Regierung vom 10. April

China wies die Bitte der UN-Hochkommissarin für Menschenrechte, Louise Arbour, zurück, Tibet besuchen zu können, um sich ein Bild der derzeitigen Lage auf die kürzlichen Proteste hin zu machen. Die chinesische Regierung antwortete, der Zeitpunkt sei nicht günstig und schlug vor, den Besuch auf ein späteres Datum zu verschieben, das beiderseitig genehm sei.

Briefmuster an Louise Arbour

Addressen des UN-Menschenrechts-rats

Brief vom 31. März an Louise Arbour

Email: larbour@ohchr.org - ccanessa@ohchr.org -  tb-petitions@ohchr.org
Fax: +41 22 917 9022

Appeal to the High-Commissioner for Human Rights to send immediately a fact-finding mission to all Tibetan areas in the People’s Republic of China.

Your Excellency,

The situation in Tibet is getting worse from day to day. There is a humanitarian catastrophe nearing fast. According to latest news the situation in Lhasa is very sad and nearing a total annihilation of the Tibetan people. It is almost starvation in the three monasteries, Ganden, Sera and Drepung. These three monasteries are cut off from electricity, water and food. People in Lhasa try to bring food to these monasteries but are not allowed to enter them. A delegation of the Red Cross should be admitted to Tibet to take care of the injured, for hospitals have been instructed to refuse them treatment. Since all communication channels have been blocked there is no way to ascertain the exaction situation, the loss of life, the number of arrested which are believed to go into thousands, the number of victims of bullets of the armed police and military and the extent of torture. Occasional unofficial reports are horrible.

Here is an excerpt of such a report about the crackdown of the armed forces on the inhabitants of Lhasa received by chance, which due to the news blackout and the closure of Tibet to the outside world unfortunately cannot be confirmed:

“All the Tibetans who dare going out are caught by the Chinese police. Now all the prisons in Tibet are full and they are transporting many Tibetans to China. Dead bodies are piled in prison cells with people who are still alive. Many of them are heavily wounded but none of them is getting any medical treatment. Many people are dying miserably slow death in prison cells. Some people committed suicide knowing that they would be killed inhumanly by the Chinese. Tibetans are tied up in lines at police stations in Lhasa and the police are doing all kinds of inhuman things on them. Human blood is flowing at all the police stations like slaughter houses. Even more horrible thing is that all the limbs of all the Tibetans who are caught by the Chinese are broken. Some Tibetans with all of their limbs broken were dropped at the door steps of their families. Many Tibetans think it's better to be dead than alive with all limbs broken. Now Tibetans live in walls and constant fear. Police are searching protesters door by door everyday. Every street and door is guarded by the police. All the monasteries around Lhasa are sealed and nobody is allowed to go in and out so people are running out of food supplies and starving but the Chinese only care about their so called stability and harmony. Many Tibetans suspect that the Chinese killed lots of people one night in front of Jokhang temple as there was constant gunfire whole night long and tanks were running all around.”

A group of 17 foreign diplomats, including an Australian official, visited the Tibetan capital Lhasa at the end of last week. One member says the group was closely watched: "At all times, the delegation was in the presence of Chinese officials," he said. The same was true for the group of journalists who were invited to Lhasa recently. All they saw was state-orchestrated. There is still no news about the brave monks of the Jokhang Temple who expressed their opinion to these journalists at the risk of their lives. The authorities ascertain nothing happened to them, but this is highly doubtful since they were taken away immediately after the incident and nothing was known about them since. The best way forward, would be for China to be open and transparent about Tibet, to open itself up to scrutiny."

In this respect, we urge you to send immediately and urgently a fact-finding mission equipped with full access to all the Tibetan areas where there had been extrajudicial or summary killings, arbitrary detention, and enforced disappearances since 10 March, when the wave of demonstrations began. According to the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy and the Tibetan Government-in-Exil the death toll is 150 and more, while 1.200 Tibetans were arrested and more than 100 disappeared. Presumably the figure of victims is much higher.

We call upon the UN Human Rights Council to hold a Special Session on the current human rights situation in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) and the Tibetan Autonomous Prefectures in the Chinese provinces of Qinghai, Gansu, Sichuan and Yunnan.

Judging from the information available to us regarding the scale of the ongoing human rights violations against the Tibetan people, it is imperative that the Human Rights Council as the principal human rights organ of the United Nations take urgent measures by convening a special session to address the current situation in China.

We urge you to swiftly call upon the Chinese authorities to receive a joint mission of Special Procedures mandate-holders on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary execution and other relevant mandates such as the Special Rapporteur on Torture, the Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Opinion and Expression and the Special Representative of Secretary-General on Human Rights Defenders.

China must re-admit foreign press immediately who should have freedom to move about without minders and censorship, China has to keep the promise it made to allow foreign journalists free movement around the whole of China in the run-up to the Olympics. China must cease the present crackdown, release all those detained and provide names of all those detained. Please refer to the site www.phayul.com to learn more about the present situation in Tibet.

Thank you very much for your attention to this appeal.

Yours sincerely,