Tibetan people hold vigil in Dharamshala, call on China to end 'repressive policies in Tibet'

Dharmashala (Himachal Pradesh) [India], December 29 : Member of Tibetan communities on Tuesday held candlelight vigil here in solidarity with a critical situation in Kham Drago, Central Tibet and called China to end its repressive policies in the region.
"Today Tibetan Youth Congress and Students for Free Tibet organised this candlelight vigil to share our solidarity with Tibetans in Kham Drago, where the situation is very critical, where the Chinese government has implemented repressive policies, where the monasteries are demolished, schools are destroyed," said a Tibetan who took part in the vigil.
"Recently in the Kham Drago, areas of Central Tibet, the Chinese government has destroyed a giant Buddhist statue. The statue is almost 600 feet statue of Buddha. And then, they also destroyed a monastery. So this vigil is s sign of China's rising repression of Tibetan practice of Buddhism inside Tibet and this is not just happening in central Tibet that we got to know recently but in many other places," said another Tibetan who took part in the vigil.
"So China's attempt to destroy aspects of Tibetan Buddhism culture is their way of homogenising, criticising entire Tibet and not only Tibet, East Turkistan and southern Mongolia also. This is an attempt to Sinicise entire China and China's occupied country," he added.
Emphasising that such Chinese activities are a threat to Tibetan's religion, culture and identity, the vigilant said that such acts by "China directly are contradictory to Beijing's promise of autonomy or rights for what is called minorities to practice their religion and culture."
"China is doing this even when their Winter Olympics is coming which is after two months.
So, therefore, we are protesting, we are leading this candle vigil, we are spreading awareness of this and we are telling China to stop the repression in Tibet," he added.