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."