The history of Chinese-Tibetan relations in the past 50+ years has been one of suppression of rights, extraction of resources, colonisation of the Tibetan lands by the majority Han Chinese, and suppression of language and religion.
In the late 2000s and early 2010s this culminated in many Tibetans undergoing self-immolation to protest the situation in their country, seeing no other recourse after talks between the Chinese Government and the Dalai Lama’s representatives broke down.
This film, made by the Voice of America around 2013, traces the long and sad history of the past 50 years in Tibet, and shows the underlying reasons for the political unrest we have seen in the past decade.
I haven’t recently heard of any self-immolations since the Chinese government announced a policy of making whole families pay for the so-called “crimes” of children, in a form of collective punishment, totally unrecognised in international law, but which no one seems able or willing to put a stop to.
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