Dharamshala, 18th July: A Tibetan named Dhondup Wangchen, who was jailed for six years after making a documentary about Tibet, is today exiled in San Francisco. Dhondup Wangchen wishes for the entire globe to choose a side. Dhondup Wangchen, emboldened by the government’s assurances to respect human rights and press freedom, took up his camera and crisscrossed Tibet in 2007, as Beijing prepared to host the Olympics for the first time. Wangchen filmed 40 hours of interviews with 108 Tibetans, in which they discussed the approaching Games, the Dalai Lama, political repression, and Han migration.
According to TIME, From exile in San Francisco, he tells that the 24-minute film he produced, Leaving Fear Behind, landed him six years in a dismal prison, where he was “tortured day and night and kept in solitary confinement for over 86 days, China broke every one of its promises.”
Today, Beijing is prepared to host the Olympics for the second time, this time on its own terms, further enhancing its image. China no longer makes vows to respect international conceptions of human rights, and it won the Winter Olympics without promising to protect its minorities. Any country that attends Beijing 2022, according to Wangchen, “will further embolden the CCP [Chinese Communist Party] to commit all kinds of crimes against humanity without any consequences or accountability.”
MPs in UK have voted to boycott the 2022 Olympic Games in Beijing.
Parliamentarians in the United Kingdom voted in favor of a motion calling on the government to boycott the Beijing Winter Olympics in 2022 unless alleged atrocities in Xinjiang are put to an end. Another condition was the lifting of Chinese sanctions against British citizens and entities. While the motions are not legally binding, they demonstrate how lawmakers in the West are becoming increasingly concerned about China’s alleged human rights violations in Xinjiang and its clampdown on Hong Kong. This comes after the European Parliament took a similar step last week.
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