Voice of America Editorial, January 11, 1997

(This editorial is broadcast in over 50 languages that the VOA has a service)

China Imprisons Tibetan Scholar

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Voice:

Chinese authorities recently sentenced Ngawang Choephel ('Nah-wong 'Chir-pel) to eighteen years in prison. A native Tibetan, Ngawang Choephel is a scholar in the field of ethnomusicology. He is affiliated with the Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts in Dharamsala, India. In 1993 and 1994, he studied and taught at Middlebury College in Vermont under the United States government's Fulbright scholarship program.

In the summer of 1995, Mr. Choephel returned to Tibet to continue his research, which involved the videotaping of traditional dances. But he soon disappeared. Thousands of Americans wrote the Chinese government to express their concern. In October 1996, the Chinese government revealed that it had been holding Mr. Choephel for more than a year. Last month, a court in Shigatse, Tibet's second-largest city, sentenced him to prison. The court claimed he had violated China's national security law.

The U.S. has no information that Ngawang Choephel was doing anything other than pursuing his professional interests in traditional music and dance. The U.S. has repeatedly stressed its concern about the preservation of Tibet's unique cultural, linguistic and religious heritage. As Gare Smith, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, pointed out:

"President Clinton and Vice President Gore, like many members of Congress and many American citizens, have enormous respect for His Holiness, the Dalai Lama his moral leadership, his spiritual teachings. Tibetan Buddhism is one of the great religions of the world, and Tibet's unique cultural and religious heritage is marvelous. And we in the administration seek, by all means, to preserve and protect it."

The U.S. calls on China to release all those held for the peaceful expression of political or religious views.