Tibetans “ready to die” to protect sacred site
Hundreds of Villagers in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) are “facing off against armed security forces” over a planned gold mine on what the Tibetans consider a sacred Mountain.
“Tibetans have historically worshiped the site,” explains a May 24 report by Radio Free Asia (RFA). But now the Chinese mining and timber company, Zhongkai Co., has been authorized to go ahead with their proposed gold mine.
The villagers have declared that they are “ready to die” to protect the sacred site.
RFA recently interviewed several local villagers, who provided some detail on the otherwise unreported situation.
According to one villager, the standoff began after “a contingent of police and security forces arrived” on May 16. The Tibetans began protesting several weeks earlier.
When the security forces appeared, the villager continues, as many as 500 Tibetans gathered on the road that leads to the mine site—and have stayed there ever since.
Another villager explains that all cellphones and landlines have been blocked and the protesters have been isolated from the rest of the village. “We can’t reach any of the protesters,” the villager states.
“Today another four vehicles with roughly 30 to 40 soldiers in them went to the protest site. But the Tibetans all put religious books on their heads and are vowing to resist even if it means sacrificing their lives,” he adds.
The villagers also say that the soldiers and police have declared that they are willing to “force their way through” to get to the site.
Ransacking Tibet
This ongoing standoff is connected to a much wider scheme to ransack Tibet of its mineral resources, particularly its gold.
According to a 2007 report by Students for a Free Tibet (SFT), there are at least seven foreign mining companies in Tibet right now: five of them from Canada and two from Britain.
The People of Tibet have absolutely “no voice when it comes to how their natural resources will be used”, says the SFT’s Stop Mining Tibet campaign website.
This ongoing standoff is unfortunate proof.
Based in Canada, Stop Mining Tibet is pushing for a moratorium on all resource extraction in the occupied region “until the Tibetan people can freely determine the use of their own resources – particularly non renewable resources.”
It is an immense challenge, but also one that we must take on as diligently as those Tibetans who are putting their lives on the line right now: in the name of justice and the preservation of their way of life.
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I think it’s only fair to let the Tibetans keep their mountain free from the destruction that mining brings.
The peoples rights should rule, generational history should be kept secure, International laws should be banned, invaders into other cultures to rape pillage lie cheat and steal should be reckoned with a hard hand by the leaders that made allowances for such if not the people of that land should take over their government at once.
The situation told in the petition reveals that no supposed untodo can occure because of the sensitive religous queston. Anyhow the petition may serve as conveyance of our passions to the security forces not to use force but to dialogue the protestors up to find a way out not touching with their religious limits while achieving the justified and legal state persuit in 21st. Century.
Is nothing sacred any more??? Is gold worth more than a mans soul??? Is gold the modern day god??? If the top layer of the sun was made of gold would we nuke it to get it???
Another abomination and defilement of sacred lands for the all mighty buck!!
This will be looked into and spiritual justice will be served,i hope and pray they come to a peaceful conclusion.Before something big strikes them for their insolence of the sacred mountain.
FYI, Radio Free Asia wrote a follow up story earlier today. Thankfully the situation never escalated to violence, but it was very very tense for the Tibetans, by the look of things. At one point organizers got all the elders and youth to leave the protest out of concern for their safety. After leaving, some of the youth actually tried to speak to higher authorities in the region about what was going on, but they were stopped.
And now, officials are claiming that everything is being “resolved”–though not to the point where the mountain will be safe. Many Tibetans are continuing to protest.
You can read the full story at http://bit.ly/SdOcp
Thanks, btw, for your comments.