Preserving Tibet: Combating Cultural Erasure, Forced Assimilation and Transnational Repression

Tibet faces new and worsening challenges from the Chinese Communist Party’s repressive rule. Threats to Tibet’s linguistic, religious, and cultural heritage have expanded in recent years, and now an estimated 80 percent of all children in the Tibet Autonomous Region are separated from their families and educated in a massive system of colonial boarding schools--a deeply troubling manifestation of the Party’s program of forced assimilation of ethnic and religious minority groups.  In recent years, police have conducted mass DNA collection and iris scanning programs in wide swathes of Tibetan society, including in monasteries and primary schools. Amid these threats to Tibetans in Tibet, the Chinese Communist Party also seeks to extend its repressive reach abroad, targeting Tibetan diaspora communities in India, Nepal, Europe, and North America for surveillance and harassment.

In this hearing, the Commission will examine growing restrictions on linguistic and cultural rights in Tibet and transnational repression faced by Tibetans abroad. The goal is to explore the diplomatic and policy options for the United States and other like-minded countries to help preserve Tibetan cultural heritage and to defend against threats and intimidation targeting Tibetans in the United States and around the world.

Archived hearing video can be viewed on the CECC’s YouTube Channel.

Hearing Transcript (PDF)