A prominent Tibetan writer has been detained, after he and a group of Tibetan intellectuals
based in Xining wrote an online open letter criticising government corruption in earthquake relief efforts:
High Peaks Pure Earth has translated two blogposts from the Xining-based Tibetan website www.sangdhor.com. The first blogpost reports the arrest of a prominent Tibetan writer and intellectual called Shogdung (or Zhogs Dung, his pen name, meaning "morning conch") on April 23, 2010 and was posted online on April 25, 2010. The second blogpost is an open letter to victims of the earthquake in Kham.
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Shogdung's real name is Tagyal (bkra rgyal) and he was a member of staff at the Nationalities Publishing House in Xining. He is the author of several books including the recent publication gnam sa go 'byed (The Line Between Sky and Earth) about the events in Tibet of 2008. In 1999, to mark the centenary of Lu Xun's death, Qinghai Tibetan News (mtsho sngon bod yig gsar 'gyur) carried two articles by Shogdung, which ignited huge debate amongst the Tibetan intellectuals in Amdo. Shogdung argued that Tibetans could only overcome their colonised condition through wholesale modernisation. He argued that Tibetans should embrace modernisation and disassociate from traditional Buddhism learning as a means of overcoming their present condition. In fact, Shogdung's hyper critical attack on traditional Tibetan cultural practices was seen by many Tibetans as remnant of the Cultural Revolution and the fact that his article was published through an official channel, it was seen as resembling the view of the CCP.
From the blogpost it would appear that Shogdung's detention is related to the earthquake in Kham of April 14. Just three days after the earthquake, on April 17, a group of prominent Tibetan intellectuals based in Qinghai's Xining province had written an open letter of condolence to the victims of the disaster. Shogdung was one of the signatories of this open letter (in his real name Tagyal) and it was published on his blog.
The open letter expresses condolences and at the same time is critical of the Chinese government in their handling of the earthquake relief efforts. Other signatories of this open letter include well known Tibetan writer and singer Jamyang Kyi and other members of the group known as the New School of Thought. The New School is a group of progressive writers who are critical of the past and argue for the need for internal reform and change in Tibetan tradition. They are highly critical of the negative aspects of Tibetan Buddhism. The Tibetan version of the open letter carries the pen names of the signatories but the Chinese version gives their full names, and also includes short descriptions of the people, and this is the version that appears below in translation.
Read more about Shogdung in this essay "Inventing Modernity in A mdo: Views on the Role of Traditional Tibetan Culture in a Developing Society" by Lauran Hartley.
The story has been picked up by mainstream media including AP, AFP,
Reuters and The Times (UK):
http://in.reuters.com/article/
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/
http://www.google.com/
As soon as his detention was reported on, the website that his open
letter appeared on was shut down: http://www.sangdhor.com
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