Human rights abuses denied
Chinese officials have defended their labour practices in Tibet in the face of growing concerns about rights abuses in the region and the Trump administration’s appointment of a senior official to scrutinise Tibetan affairs.
Tibet Governor Qi Zhala said yesterday in Lhasa that forced labour transfer “does not exist” and he maintained that the local government was focused on “increasing the idle workforce’s income through job-skills training”.
Mr Qi, who was speaking about poverty alleviation efforts, maintained that the Tibetan government had provided travel subsidies for people to work in other regions and that they were free to come and go at will.
His comments came hours after US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo named Robert Destro, the assistant secretary of the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labour, as a special coordinator for Tibetan issues. Mr Destro will be responsible for advancing dialogue between Beijing and the Dalai Lama and protecting the religious, cultural and linguistic identity of Tibetans, the State Department said.
Tibet and the neighbouring region of Xinjiang have long endured intense social, security and religious controls, as China seeks to suppress what it calls terrorist and separatist elements. Last month, prominent Xinjiang researcher Adrian Zenz released a report alleging that the People’s Republic was instituting a mass labour system in Tibet similar to the one that has ensnared Muslim Uighurs.
“The United States remains concerned with the PRC’s repression of the Tibetan community, including the lack of meaningful autonomy, the deteriorating human rights situation in Tibetan areas and severe restrictions on Tibetans’ religious freedom,” Mr Pompeo said.
The Tibet revelations could feed US efforts to expand punitive measures against China. The US was exploring the possibility of seizing all cotton imports from China’s Xinjiang region, acting Homeland Security Deputy Secretary Ken Cuccinelli said last month.
China’s policies towards Tibet have long been contentious, with support for the region’s autonomy and its exiled spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, often a bipartisan issue in Washington.
Its foreign ministry last month denied that forced labour was being used, insisting that workers participated voluntarily and were being properly compensated.