Ethnic Minority Rights

A report released by the Tibet Information Network (TIN) on January 20, 2005, documents a sharp decline in the employment of Tibetans in government-run services and companies in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) since 2000. The report bases observations on official Chinese statistics on employment for the years 2000-2003. TIN explains that the report covers the category, "staff and workers," which, in the context of official statistics, refers to "government cadres (officials) and their subordinates; teachers, doctors, nurses, and others working in social services; managers, professionals and workers in urban and township and village enterprises, whether state-owned, collectively-owned, privately-owned or owned by foreigners; the formally urban self-employed and foreigners working in any of the above units."

The Chinese central government plans to provide all of the country's villages with radio and television access by the end of 2010, according to an August 12 report in the Chinese Minorities News. The report notes that expanding broadcast access brings "positive social results and ensures that the Party and government's voice enters into every household." More than 400,000 small villages, primarily in areas inhabited by ethnic minorities, remain without access to radio or television. The central government has invested more than 1.75 billion yuan since 1998 to increase broadcast accessibility in poor areas, and since July 2000 has developed special programs to expand broadcast coverage specifically in the Xinjiang Uighur and Tibet Autonomous Regions, and border areas.

Rails for the Qinghai-Tibet railroad were laid at 16,641 feet (5,072 meters), the highest elevation that the railway will reach, on August 24, according to a Xinhua report. Vice Minister of Railways Sun Yongfu acknowledged that laying the tracks at Qinghai's Tanggula Pass was "a tough part" of the project. High altitude and frigid conditions pose "a major challenge," according to La Youyu, deputy director-general of the project's headquarters. He said that nearly 300 miles of track cross frozen earth that is "vulnerable to climate change" and can thaw during summer and "distend the railway base in winter." Railway design incorporates measures that include "heat preservation, slope protection, and roadbed ventilation in frozen earth areas" in order to "avoid possible dangers," La said.

The Communist Party's United Front Work Department (UFWD) established a new bureau to handle Tibetan affairs in 2005 and appointed Sithar (Sita, or Si Ta), a Tibetan, as Director, according to an article in Singtao Daily (translated in OSC 15 September 06). The Tibetan affairs portfolio moved from the Second Bureau, which handles ethnic and religious affairs, to the new Seventh Bureau. Sithar previously served as a deputy director of the Second Bureau. The UFWD oversees the implementation of Party policy toward China's eight "democratic" political parties, ethnic and religious groups, intellectuals, and entrepreneurs, among other functions.

The Ministry of Education (MOE) announced on September 14 that students graduating from about 100 universities run by the central government and who have borrowed from the government to finance their educations may have their loan repayments waived if they agree to work in China's "western or remote areas," according to a September 15 China Daily report. Graduates will be eligible for loan waivers of up to 24,000 yuan (US$2,970) if they work for at least three years in locations at the county-level or below.

Ismail Amat, Vice Chairman of the National People's Congress Standing Committee (NPCSC), praised the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region (IMAR) government for its successes in advancing the ethnic minority autonomy system and implementing the Regional Ethnic Autonomy Law (REAL), according to a July 17 report from the State Ethnic Affairs Commission Web site. He added that the IMAR should serve as a model for other ethnic minority autonomous regions. The article did not detail concrete measures undertaken in the region to realize ethnic autonomy but rather made a connection between economic development achievements in the IMAR and the promotion of regional ethnic autonomy.

Yu Yungui, a senior official in the Rikaze (Shigatse) prefectural government in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), announced that the government plans to extend the Tibet-Qinghai railway westward from Lhasa to Rikaze city, the TAR's second-largest city, according to an August 9 Xinhua report. The extension would total about 270 kilometers (about 170 miles). Yu said that officials expect the project to take three years, suggesting that it would be completed some time in 2009. Jampa Phuntsog (Xiangba Pingcuo), the Chairman of the TAR government, told reporters in March that he expects the railway to reach Rikaze during the period covered by the 11th Five-Year Plan (2006-2010), according to a March 13 China Tibet Information Center (CTIC) report.

Schools in Artush city, Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region (XUAR), will teach all first grade elementary school classes in Mandarin Chinese beginning in September 2006, according to a July 11 article in the Xinjiang Daily. Artush is the capital of the Kizilsu Kirgiz Autonomous Prefecture in the XUAR. The prefectural government and Party committee, which are jointly carrying out the policy, will require all primary and secondary schools to teach exclusively in Mandarin by the year 2012. Since March 2006, teachers in 76 preschool classes in the city have instructed students entirely in Mandarin, the article reported. In Artush, 80 percent of the population is Uighur, Kirgiz make up 12 percent, and Han Chinese almost 8 percent, according to 2001 statistics available on the Kizilsu Kirgiz Autonomous Prefecture government’s Web site.