Testimony by Passang Lhamo
(Washington DC | May 1, 2002)
Passang Lhamo, Tibetan nun and former political Prisoner, to the US Congressional Human Rights Caucus
Thank you very much for the opportunity to address members of the Congressional Human Rights Caucus. Although I never imagined a time when I myself would come to America and speak out for my people, we Tibetans have long looked to America and its Congress for much needed support. I am especially grateful that my appeal will be heard during the visit to America of China's Vice President, Hu Jintao, who also served as Communist Party Secretary in Tibet from 1988-1992. If Hu Jintao's ambitions are met, he will become China's next leader.
At such a time, Hu Jintao will be in the position to deal responsibly with his legacy in Tibet. It is my prayer that he will release those remaining political prisoners who were detained during his tenure as Party chief in Tibet and continue to suffer in jail. The American Congress has raised the cases of Tibetan political prisoners repeatedly with Chinese officials, and Ngawang Choephel an Tanak Jigme Sanpo were both released this year. I would like to tell you the names of those nuns with whom I was imprisoned in old Unit 3 of Lhasa's Drapchi prison and who were imprisoned under Hu's authority. I respectfully ask you to help secure their freedom. They are: Phuntsog Nyidrol and Namdrol Lhamo who are in very poor health and have also been terribly affected psychologically by prison beatings and torture. Tenzin Thubten, Rigzin Choenyi, Ngawang Choexom, Ngawang Choekyi who all suffer ill health. Jigme Yangchen who is subject to sudden anxiety and panic attacks. Ngawang Tsamdrol and Ngawang Sangdrol who have both sustained head injuries from repeated beatings. Should she survive her imprisonment, Ngawang Sangdrol, from my own nunnery, Garu Nunnery, detained at age 15 in June 1992, will serve 23 years in prison.
My own story and experience in prison is much like theirs. I decided to become a nun when I was 14-years old. Until then I worked my family's farmland looking after the animals. In the nunnery I spent most of the time either doing renovation and restoration work or in political education classes given by local officials. In these classes we were told that Tibet had been "liberated" by China and that the Chinese government had made many improvements in Tibet, which had previously been a backward and superstitious society. We were very unhappy being made to listen to these things and to parrot their propaganda. In my heart, I began to understand how the Chinese government was controlling our people. Monks and nuns are especially persecuted in Tibet but lay people are also oppressed. Anyone who dares utter a word about human rights for Tibetans, His Holiness the Dalai Lama or Tibetan independence is imprisoned. Sometimes people try to distribute leaflets or print and paste posters but the punishments are severe and one has only to be suspected of such political activities to be arrested. On 25th May 1994, I, along with four other nuns, went to Lhasa to shout slogans and to protest. We were immediately set upon the police and brought to Gutsa detention center. As Choeying described, my treatment was the same, even down to the blood taken before my release. In November 1994, I was taken along with 13 other nuns to Drapchi prison to serve a 5-year sentence for "endangering state security." I was placed in "old" Unit 3, a unit for female political prisoners. Already in this unit were nuns who had been imprisoned since 1989.
In April 1996 all the inmates of "old" Unit 3, nearly 100 female political prisoners, decided to stage a hunger strike in protest of the merciless beatings and harsh treatment in Drapchi. We refused to eat or drink anything. After a week, the prison officials became very worried about this hunger strike and how it would harm the national reputation. They warned us that they had the medical facilities to stop a hunger strike and told us to stop rather than continue. They promised that if we stopped the hunger strike then the beatings and torture would stop. When we refused, they force-fed us and put water in our mouths. Some nuns who were in a grave state were given intravenous fluids. However, beatings and torture routinely continued to take place just as before the hunger strike. Ngawang Sangdrol was blamed as being the ringleader for the hunger strike and her sentence was consequently extended by an additional eight years. After the demonstration on 1st May 1998, which Choeying discussed, the authorities were still determined to have their way. Incredibly, on 4th May, International Youth Day, they again brought prisoners into the yard, although far fewer than the first time. Again, the prisoners refused to participate in the official scheme. My entire unit was locked in our cells, although we could see and hear what was happening through the windows, which we soon smashed out. We began to shout slogans to support those in the courtyard and were very panicked as we watched the beatings continue.
In 24th May 1999, after five years in Drapchi prison, I was set free having served my sentence. When I returned home to Penpo, I soon realized that my freedoms and those of my family were so curtailed as to make life unbearable for us all. I also learned of Choeying's situation. Unknown to our families and relatives, we made plans to leave Tibet. To get the necessary permission to leave Penpo, we told the authorities that we needed to travel to Lhasa for medical care. In Lhasa, we were able to secure the services of a guide. I cannot describe how full was my heart when a year after my release from prison, I was given an audience with His Holiness the Dalai Lama, as is customary for all new arrivals from Tibet. Of course, I was deeply saddened to leave my homeland but His Holiness comforted us, saying that in India we would live in a free and democratic country, we no longer had to be afraid, we could practice our religion freely. Choeying and I now live in Dharamsala. She is in Ganden Choeling Nunnery, only a short walk from His Holiness the Dalai Lama's monastery and residence, and I am in Sara School preparing for a course of religious study.
I hope you can visit our community in Dharamsala and see what religious freedom is like for us. Then, I hope you will go to Tibet and see what the absence of religious freedom is like. Again, I thank you sincerely for this precious opportunity to bear witness to the suffering of my brothers and sisters. Ever since I was a little girl, I would hear about how America loved liberty and stood by Tibet. It is the hope of all Tibetans, both in Tibet and in exile, that the American government will prevail upon China to help my people and free Tibet. I ask you, please, to raise the cases of all those who continue to languish unjustly in prisons, and especially my sisters whose names I have mentioned today.
Friends of Tibet (INDIA),
PO Box 16674, Bombay 400050
www.friendsoftibet.org