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OBITUARY: ROBERT FORD (1923-2013)

By Tenzin Zega (UK)

The only Inji to serve as an employee of an independent Tibetan government, we Tibetans owe an immense sense of gratitude to Robert Ford (or “Phodo” as he was called in Tibet) who died on Friday morning, the 20^th of September, at the age of 90.

He was of course the famous radio operator in Chamdo responsible for connecting the town to the capital, Lhasa. But Ford was much more than that. Ford loved the Tibetan people and wanted to help the country with his skills. He forged strong friendships with progressive Tibetan minds like Jigme Taring and Dzasa Tsarong to usher Tibet into 20^th century. The Tibetan Government wanted him to set up a radio network throughout Tibet.

Indeed, had his advice been heeded about installing a forward radio post closer to the border at Riwoche, it is possible that Chamdo would not have fallen so quickly. One only wishes it was the more open Lhalu, rather than Ngaboe who had to face the invading Chinese as Governor General of Kham, because Lhalu and Ford had a more open working relationship. Ngaboe, on the other hand, according to Ford, was distant and formal. As a Tibetan, one can only feel ashamed by the way Ford was abandoned by Ngaboe at Chamdo to the advancing Chinese army.

A grammar school boy brought up in Burton-on-Trent in England, Ford worked as a radio technician during World War II and in 1945 joined the British Mission in Lhasa as a radio operator, having his first audience with a 11 year old Kundun. Thanks to India gaining independence, Ford returned to Tibet in 1947 to be employed by the Tibetan Government.

Like the other injis in Tibet at the same time, such as Heinrich Harrer and Peter Aufschnaiter, Ford was lured by the ‘mystique and adventure’ of Tibet – although he did introduce the tango to Lhasa! These injis – although from very different backgrounds – were united in their love for the land and the people and had a common desire to modernise Tibet whilst retaining her unique culture. Indeed, while receiving the Light of Truth Award from the Dalai Lama in April 2013, Ford said that his time in Tibet had been “the happiest years” of his life.

Newspapers at the time described him as “the loneliest Briton in the world”. Of course, Ford disputed that, saying he was having the “adventure” of his life – until, of course, China’s invasion. Unlike other Injis who socialised with the upper echelons of Tibetan society (mainly in the capital), Ford’s posting in Chamdo meant that he mingled with ordinary Tibetans and could keenly observe their customs and manners.

He was a true friend of Tibet who stood shoulder to shoulder with the Tibetan people in their hour of need. Although Ford was offered the chance to leave for England before the 1950 Chinese invasion, he stayed – out of loyalty to Tibet – a decision which subsequently cost him nearly five years in jail in China. He suffered repeated interrogation and thought reform, living in constant fear of death, until his release and expulsion in 1955. He had been accused of being a spy for the British and causing the death of a pro-Chinese Tibetan Lama. His imprisonment would have perhaps been reduced had he revealed his ‘suspicions’ about the real perpetrator but Ford – true to his character – endured the suffering rather than betray a Tibetan. Unsurprisingly, he has taken the secret to his grave.

He wrote about this experience in “Captured in Tibet” published in 1957 (and republished in the USA in 1990).

After the Tibet phase of his life, Ford served as a diplomat in various posts around the world ending his career as Consul–General in Geneva, Switzerland before retiring in 1983. In 1982 he had been awarded a CBE (Commander of the Order of the British Empire). During his retirement he resumed his active campaign for Tibetan freedom: Ford was visibly moved when the Tibetan community in the UK celebrated his 90^th birthday earlier in the year at Tibet House (London) in honour of all the work he had done for Tibet.

He is survived by his two sons Martin and Giles.

Yak brings Tibet message to London on his bike

A Tibetan nomad completes his solo cycling tour of 13 European countries – covering over 5000 miles, and then leaves for Japan to further his mission to highlight China’s abuse of human rights in his homelands.

London, 13 August 2013:

He is 42, father of two young teenagers. He says he is in good health and loves cycling. Since 2000, Rinpo Yak has cycled across 44 of the 50 states in the US – covering over 8,400 miles. In March this year, coinciding with the anniversary of the Tibetan National Uprising, Yak set out his latest global solo cycling tour from Brussels, the European Union’s Headquarters.

Since 2009, Ngaba (Chinese: Aba) of Amdo Province in eastern Tibet has witnessed the largest number of Tibetans resorting to self-immolations in protest of Chinese government’s misguided policy on Tibet. Showing solidarity with his brethren in Tibet, Yak said, “I am a Tibetan from Ngaba. I have been living in the US with my family since 1998 after fleeing Tibet into Nepal the year before. My main mission for undertaking this global cycling tour is to raise the deplorable condition of human rights in Tibet whilst carrying the messages of over 120 self-immolated Tibetans, who died calling for freedom and the return of our Spiritual Leader His Holiness the Dalai Lama, to the international community.”

In Europe, Yak cycled across 13 countries where he met with over 120 public figures such as parliamentarians, government officials and human rights advocates. Yak arrived in Britain two weeks ago after cycling across Europe, including Belgium, France, Germany, Norway, Holland, Spain and Italy. London was the final stop in his European leg of the cycling tour, where he had meetings with government officials, parliamentarian and NGOs representatives. In addition to media interviews, Yak also met with local Tibetan communities and Tibet support groups across Europe.

On his arrival in the British capital on 2 August, Yak gave a live interview with Washington-based Voice of America’s (VOA) Tibetan Language programme from their London studio. Yak said that the European countries were showing overwhelming support and solidarity with the Tibetan people, and the public figures he met with were also candid about the growing influence of China’s economic power, indicating clear challenges to the Tibetan struggle in the years ahead.

Honouring Yak’s arrival, Thubten Samdup, London-based Representative of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and members of Tibetan Community in Britain hosted a cordial reception at The Office of Tibet. They applauded Yak’s individual initiative for the Tibetan cause, which was very inspiring and motivating.

Yak then took part in the Prudential RideLondon FreeCycle festival on the following day, which organisers estimated some 50,000 cyclists joined in the streets of London. Yak stood out from the cyclists as he was flying Tibetan national flag on his bike!

During the week, Yak participated in an action protest jointly organised by Free Tibet and Students for a Free Tibet outside the InterContinental Westminster Hotel in central London. The two leading Tibet groups have been urging the InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) to withdraw from their involvements in ‘The InterContinental Resort Lhasa Paradise’, which is opening soon in Lhasa. The Tibet campaigning groups maintain that the IHG presence and its naming of the hotel as the “Lhasa Paradise” is a ‘propaganda gift to the Chinese regime’ which is responsible for gross human rights abuses throughout Tibet, and severe repression, surveillance and denial of human rights in Lhasa in particular. The campaigners also said that the Chinese authorities may use the hotel and its business facilities to discuss and implement further repressive measures in Tibet.

Whilst acknowledging their Tibet campaigning work, Yak visited offices of several groups, including Free Tibet and Tibet Society, and urged them to continue their support for Tibetan people. They also helped Yak with facilitating meetings and media contact.

The main highlights of Yak’s London engagements were his meetings with the Foreign & Commonwealth Office, Member of Parliament, Amnesty International and the BBC World Service. Accompanied by London-based Tibetans, Rinpo Yak urged the Foreign Office to note Tibetan people’s aspirations when dealing with the Chinese government. He further urged Britain impress upon China to review its hardline policies in Tibet, address the genuine grievances of the Tibetan people through dialogue and allow unfettered access to Tibet for the media and UN. The Tibetan delegate reiterated that Tibetans in Tibet were simply calling for their freedom and the return of His Holiness the Dalai Lama.

Despite the British Parliament in summer recess at present, Jeremy Corbyn, an MP for Islington North, met Rinpo Yak with several Tibetans at the weekend in his constituency. The Labour MP, who has previously raised Tibet issue in the Parliament, was quoted in the local newspaper – The Islington Tribune, by saying, “It was a pleasure to welcome Rinpo to Islington as part of his cycling tour around the world for human rights and against cultural suppression in Tibet.

“We have a locally based Tibet support campaign which I am happy to work with during their lobby of parliament on the treatment of Tibetan people, and as a fellow cyclist I admire his stamina in visiting 12 counties in Europe and over 40 states in the USA as part of his world tour to highlight the treatment of the people of Tibet.”

Yak spent some time with Temtsel Hao, producer at the BBC World Service Chinese programme. Later, the BBC World Service published an article about the meeting on its Chinese website. A local newspaper also reported Yak’s stopover in the Royal Borough of Greenwich, south London, which is home to nearly 100 Tibetans.

At the meetings, Yak asked concerned officials to write messages of support and pledges to act in his notebooks, which he plans to present to the Dalai Lama and then the European Union and United Nations.

The Tibetan Community in Britain, Greenwich Tibetan Association and Kailash Momo Tibetan Restaurant hosted receptions, farewell dinners and made donations to Rinpo Yak. Individual Tibetans offered khatas and spontaneous donations in support of Yak’s exemplary mission for the Tibetan cause.

After his successful UK and European cycling tour, Yak left for Japan on the morning of 12 August to continue his mission. From Japan, Yak plans to cycle to Taiwan and possibly China. His final destination is India, where Yak hopes to receive an audience with the Dalai Lama.

(This report is compiled by Tsering Passang, who assisted Rinpo Yak’s key engagements in London with Lodup Gyatso.)

By Hannah Beech @TIMEWorldJuly 02, 2013

Can he be seen or not? Last week, different organizations that follow Tibet, including Radio Free Asia, reported that in certain Tibetan regions, local authorities appeared to be allowing images of the Dalai Lama, the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader, to be openly venerated for religious purposes. The seeming policy shift in parts of Sichuan and Qinghai provinces with large Tibetan populations was seen as possible evidence of a gentler approach to the troubled region by the new Chinese Communist Party (CCP) chief Xi Jinping. (Xi’s predecessor, Hu Jintao, was once the hard-line party head for Tibet and his decade in power as China’s top leader was marked by continued repression on the Tibetan plateau.)

Adding to the positive indications, London-based advocacy group Free Tibet said on June 27 that local officials told monks at a monastery in Lhasa, the tightly controlled capital of the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), that the Dalai Lama’s image could now be publicly displayed for the first time in 17 years. This report provoked particular interest because government suppression of Tibetan spiritual and cultural expression has been harsher in the TAR than in Tibetan parts of Sichuan, Qinghai, Gansu and Yunnan provinces.

But on June 28, China’s Foreign Ministry told journalists in Beijing that there had been no change at all in the country’s Tibet policy. On July 1, Free Tibet reported that Tibetan residents of Qinghai province had received a text message on their cellphones saying that the government’s policy toward the Dalai Lama — whom Chinese officials have called everything from “a wolf in monk’s clothing” to a cult leader akin to David Koresh of Waco fame — remained the same. The text message, according to a translation provided by Free Tibet, was attributed to the spokesperson of the Qinghai Nationality and Religious Affairs Committee and said:

In the recent days, some people have spread rumors online, by SMS and on Wechat [a Chinese social-media service] saying a new policy has been introduced in the Tibetan Area [of Qinghai]. We clearly announce that there is no change in the policy of CCP and Government toward the 14th Dalai [Lama]. The policy is consistent and steady. So the rumors spread by some people are only exaggeration. It is their purpose to distort what they see and disturb the minds of the people. They intend to ruin development and security in the Tibetan area. Relying on the care and help given by Central Government for many years, economy and society in Tibetan areas of our province have been comprehensively improved. The life of farmers and nomads is conspicuously improved. The people are enjoying protection of freedom of faith and of the regular activities of religious practice. We should cherish this good state, which is rare to achieve. We should not make rumors, should not believe rumors, and should not spread rumors but should develop the economy of Tibetan area in our province and should spontaneously try our best to guard the social security of Tibetan area.

The text message was sent eight days before the Dalai Lama’s birthday on July 6, a date around which Tibetans have rallied despite earlier government diktats banning them from celebrating the date. Since 2009, around 120 Tibetans have burned themselves in protest of the Chinese government, which they accuse of heavy-handed repression. Many of those who have died in fiery dissent have chosen as their final words praise for the Dalai Lama, who fled Tibet in 1959 after a failed rebellion against the Chinese state. Last month the 77-year-old Dalai Lama said the self-immolations have had little ability to influence Beijing’s Tibet policy but that he understood the desperation that has led everyone from monks to young mothers to douse themselves with petrol and strike a match.

For its part, the Chinese government accuses the Dalai Lama (and his supporters) of orchestrating the self-immolations, a charge he denies. Beijing says that the CCP has dramatically improved the living standard of Tibetans since its troops marched onto the high plateau in 1950. Certain Tibetan areas are, indeed, profiting from a mining boom, and cities in the region have expanded quickly. But some Tibetans say that members of China’s Han ethnic majority, who have poured into the region in recent years looking for economic opportunities, have profited disproportionately from that growth.

A Human Rights Watch report released on June 27 estimated that since 2006 more than 2 million Tibetans have been relocated, often forcibly, as nomads and farmers are pushed off the land and into resettlement enclaves or so-called New Socialist Villages. In late June, the People’s Daily, the official mouthpiece of the CCP, announced that the extensive reconstruction of Lhasa’s old town, where some of Tibetan Buddhism’s most sacred monuments exist, had the support of 96% of locals. Nevertheless, 100,000 people worldwide have signed a petition asking UNESCO, which has designated Lhasa a World Heritage site, to investigate reports that the city’s cultural legacy is being destroyed.

And what of the Dalai Lama’s image? When I was in a Tibetan part of western Sichuan in late 2011 to report on the rise of self-immolations, I saw his photos displayed discreetly in countless places: in small provisions stores, in monks’ quarters, on cellphone screens, even in large temples where Han Chinese tourists flock to. No one I talked to seemed clear as to whether his image was formally banned or not. But that didn’t stop them from quietly worshipping his picture.

Meanwhile, advocacy groups who follow Tibet have been hampered by the strangulated flow of information from the high plateau. Often when a self-immolation happens, phone and Internet access to the area is compromised. For such a vast, lightly populated region, the security apparatus in Tibet is fearsome. Still, Eleanor Byrne-Rosengren, the director of Free Tibet, has sounded a guardedly optimistic note: “For the present, the regional government believes it is necessary to deny any such change in policy,” she says. “But this does not preclude the possibility that a change may be introduced later.”

Read more: http://world.time.com/2013/07/02/signs-of-the-dalai-lama-is-chinas-tibet-policy-changing/#ixzz2Y5aleF99

Teresa condemns China’s human rights abuses in Tibet  and raises concerns about the Panchen Lama on his 24th Birthday

April 25, 2013 by Teresa Pearce MP

Teresa yesterday met with Tsering Passang, a member of Tibetan Community in Britain, to discuss his concerns about China’s continued human rights abuses in Tibet.

Mr Passang explained that the situation in Tibet is extremely distressing, and is characterised by continued human rights abuses.  He explained that the instances of self-immolation are increasing as the Tibetan people struggle to fight against their oppression.

He also explained that today is the 24^th birthday of Gedhun Choekyi Nyima, the Panchen Lama, who was taken from his home at the age of 6-years-old. He has not been seen since this time, and nobody yet knows what happened to him.

Teresa said:

“Human rights abuses in Tibet cannot be ignored by the international community. The introduction of oppressive policies, and the unfair oppression of legitimate protests, cannot continue. The increase in cases of self-immolation by Tibetan people in protest against their repression shows how desperate their plight is, and how crucial it is to peacefully resolve this situation as soon as possible.

I am very concerned about the welfare of Gedhun Choekyi Nyima, the Panchen Lama, who was taken by the Chinese authorities when he was just six-years-old. This means he could have been the world’s youngest political prisoner.

Today marks his 24^th birthday, and neither he, nor his family, have been seen since the day he was taken. I think it is crucial that pressure groups, governments and other international bodies continue to press China to answer questions about his whereabouts.

The Tibetan people should be given all the support necessary to ensure they can enjoy the freedoms that we take for granted. Religious freedom should be a right, not a privilege.

I have previously written to the Foreign & Commonwealth Office to ask what action is being taken to support the Tibetan people, and I will continue to press the Government to work effectively with other concerned governments to resolve the grievances of the Tibetan people, and to ensure that their human rights are respected.”

Tibet Relief Fund