Tibetan Canadians call for Canada’s support to the Sino-Tibetan dialogue.
Ottawa, December 13, 2022 – Tibetan Canadians are urging Parliament to actively support the long-stalled Sino-Tibetan dialogue and help resolve the 70-year-old international conflict. Community members from Canada expect all-party support for a parliamentary motion on a Sino-Tibetan dialogue that will be debated and voted on this week in the House of Commons. The last time any Tibetan motion received unanimous consent in the House of Commons was in 2007 when NDP MP Peggy Nash introduced a motion on the same topic – Canada’s support for the resumption of the Sino-Tibetan dialogue.
Earlier this year, Tibetan activist Sangyal Kyab from Parkdale High Park, Toronto, went on cross-Canada cycling from Vancouver to Toronto to raise awareness about the ongoing human rights violations in Tibet and to ask for Canada’s support to negotiate a dialogue between the representatives of the Tibetan people and the Chinese government. It marked his third consecutive year of the long-distance rally for Tibet. In 2020 and 2021, Sangyal completed over 800km of peace walk (Toronto to Ottawa roundtrip) to bring the Canadian government’s attention to Tibet.
Similarly, another group of activists led by Pema Kunga from Toronto completed a long-distance marathon covering a distance of more than 1,000 km from Toronto – Montreal – Ottawa and back to Toronto. They also called for Canada’s active support to the resumption of the Sino-Tibetan dialogue.
The calls for Canada’s support to Tibet come amidst the reports of growing human rights violations in Tibet, including the news of thousands of Tibet children being put into residential schools, an increase in arbitrary arrest and torture, forced relocation of Tibetan nomads, destruction of Tibetan heritages sites, and other forms of a systematic attack on Tibetan identity.
Anyone found speaking out against the state policies in Tibet is deemed as a separatist state enemy. Even a mild criticism against local officials can land Tibetans in years of prison. Tibetan religious leaders, especially the global peace icon His Holiness the Dalai Lama, have been repeatedly demonized by Chinese officials, who have called him a wolf in monk robes on several occasions. Tibetans have to lead a non-violent, peaceful struggle based on Gandhi’s principle of Ahimsa (non-violence) against its invasion and yet are called violent and have refused to hold any negotiation for more than ten years now.
In May this year, Canada’s Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade adopted an all-party motion in support of the Sino-Tibetan dialogue during the visit of Tibetan political leader Sikyong Penpa Tsering to Ottawa.