“They are destroying our Tibetan [herder] communities by not
letting us live in our area and thus wiping out our livelihood
completely, making it difficult for us to survive in this world, as
we have been [herders] for generations. The Chinese are not letting
us carry on our occupation and forcing us to live in Chinese-built
towns, which will leave us with no livestock and we won’t be able
to do any other work, so we will surely be beggars.”
F.R., Tibetan from Machen (Maqin), Qinghai province,
November 2004
“Land suitable for forest should be planted with trees and land
suitable for grass should be planted with grass, and the policy of
giving up farming for forest and giving up animal husbandry for
grass should be diligently continued and carried forward. The
traditional livelihood of the [herders] should be exchanged for
market economy and prosperity should be embraced.”
F.H., from Pema (Banma) county, Golok prefecture, describing
Chinese policy in his home district, January 2006
“Because there are no Chinese living in the remote pastoral areas
of Tibet, many of our local people believe that the policy of putting
Tibetan herders in the towns is in order to control those areas, and
after the older generation passes away, we will gradually be
assimilated into the towns…”
A.M., from Machen county, Qinghai Province, September
2005
“No new houses have been built, they have just put new doors and
windows in the old prison buildings. The government made a lot of
publicity about bringing electric and water facilities, but those who
moved there say there is no such facility. The government talks
about providing food subsidy eventually, but so far they got
nothing…”
Z.R., from Chabcha county, Qinghai province, January 2005
To read the report, “No One Has the Liberty to Refuse: Tibetan Herders
Forcibly Relocated in Gansu, Qinghai, Sichuan and the Tibet Autonomous
Region,” please visit: http://hrw.org/reports/2007/tibet0607/
For more of Human Rights Watch’s work on China and Tibet, please visit:
http://www.hrw.org/chinese/
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