CHINA-TIBET: 3 TIBETANS ARRESTED FOR POSSESSING PHOTOGRAPHS OF DESTRUCTION OF LARUNG GAR TIBETAN BUDDHIST ACADEMY
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Radio Free Asia (RFA-Feb 2) said that Chinese authorities in Sichuan province have arrested three Tibetan
Buddhists who they claim were in possession of “politically sensitive information” as they returned from a
pilgrimage. Citing Tibetan sources in exile, RFA said the three Tibetans named Asang, Dodra, and Nortso
were interrogated by police on January 10 while traveling home to Chamdo prefecture's Dakyab township
from the sprawling Larung Gar Tibetan Buddhist Academy in Sichuan’s Serta (in Chinese, Seda) county and
later arrested. These sources said “Their cellphones were examined by police in Drago (Luhuo) county in the
Kardze (Ganzi) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture and all three of them were arrested for ‘possessing
politically sensitive information and pictures’. They were handed over to police in Chamdo and are currently
held at the Chamdo Police Station.” A second Tibetan in exile, who also declined to be named, told RFA that
the content on their phones was related to the destruction late last month of a three-story statue of Maitreya
Buddha at Gaden Namyal Ling monastery in Drago. He said “They were interrogated by the police in Drago
when they were arrested. The police looked into all the group chat apps on their cellphones and charged them
for keeping videos and pictures of the recent destruction of the Buddhist statue in Drago and also using those
images as their screensaver wallpaper.”
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