Open Letter to The G7 Leaders

12^th June 2021

Dear Leaders of the G7,

My name is Tsering Passang.  I am Tibetan and was born in a refugee camp in Nepal as my country, Tibet, was occupied by force by the People’s Republic of China after the CCP came to power in 1949.  Along with HH the Dalai Lama and some 140,000 of my fellow-countrymen I continue to live in exile rather than under communist occupation.

As refugees we seek justice and freedom.  Since 2009, more than 155 Tibetans, young, old, monks, nuns and lay-people, have died by self-immolation in a determined attempt to draw attention to the repression, exploitation and military occupation of Tibet which was a peaceful and devout country before the Chinese takeover.

Before 1950, not a single Chinese soldier was stationed along the entire Himalayan border and Tibet was a peaceful buffer state between the world’s two most populous countries – democratic India and totalitarian China.  Last year saw serious clashes on that border, and both India and China (nuclear powers both) have tens of thousands of troops confronting one-another in battle readiness. 

Tibet and East Turkestan

In  a welcome development after the Foreign & Development Ministers’ Summit last month in London, the G7 Statement highlighted China’s on-going abuse of human rights in Tibet and Xinjiang (East Turkestan).  It is well-known that Party Secretary Chen Quanghuo, currently responsible for the oppression of the Uyghurs, learnt his trade in Tibet – named by Freedom House earlier this year as the least free country on Earth (in a tie with Syria). 

The South China Sea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Southern (Inner) Mongolia

Democratic Taiwan and democracy-loving Hong Kong are constantly threatened and harassed by China.  Buddhist Inner Mongolia, like Tibet and Xinjiang, has been flooded with immigrant Han Chinese in a deliberate attempt to extinguish its identity.  The USA and its allies must now patrol the South China Sea to prevent its military domination by China.

Redress via the UN is impossible because of the veto exercised by China and supported by its beneficiaries.

The Central Asian Plateau/Tibet (the ‘Third Pole’) and Climate Change

What happens in Tibet and the Central Asian Plateau affects the whole of Asia and the planet itself.  Ten of the world’s major rivers flow from Tibet to India and China – including the Indus, Ganges, Yangtze and Mekong.  Half the world’s population depend on these rivers for irrigation and food.  Irresponsible policies of the CCP, including the damming of rivers, threaten the melting of glaciers and permafrost and cause irreversible damage to the fragile eco-system.  Along with its pollution, China alone can cause environmental catastrophe and can trigger mass migration.

What can be done?

On behalf of the peoples currently unwillingly under CCP control, and including the peoples of Taiwan and Hong Kong, we call on G7 leaders to:

1. prioritise the Central Asian (Tibetan) Plateau in the international discourse on tackling climate change;
2. support a UN-supervised and legally binding international agreement (similar to the Antarctic Treaty System) to address the threats to Asia’s water supply;
3. establish a Scientific Committee on Central Asian/Third Pole research to share data and develop strategic plans to preserve scarce freshwater resources;
4. urge the UN to declare the entire Tibetan Plateau an environmentally sensitive area, ensuring minimal infrastructure projects and a complete cessation of mining, deforestation and dam-building;
5. urge the People’s Republic of China to stop the persecution of environmental conservationists and declare the entire region a Zone of Peace.

I thank you for your attention.

Yours faithfully,

Tsering Passang

Founder & Convener, 

Global Alliance for Tibet & Persecuted Minorities (GATPM)

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