According to RFA, a Tibetan college graduate was imprisoned last year in northwest China’s Qinghai province for speaking out against Chinese regulations requiring the teaching of Chinese language in Tibetan areas. According to a source living in exile, Loten, 23, was apprehended on Dec. 20 in Matoe (in Chinese, Maduo) county in the Golog (Guoluo) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture after complaining on social media to the replacement of Tibetan-language textbooks in local schools. “He said that China’s policy will eventually disconnect young Tibetans from their own language in the future,” an RFA source said, citing Matoe contacts and speaking on the condition of anonymity for security concerns. According to the source, Loten is now being kept in an undisclosed location in Xining, the provincial capital of Qinghai. His family was only informed of his arrest over the phone and hasn’t been allowed to see him yet. They were told that Loten is now being given political education,” he added.
The Tibetan language has been phased out as a medium of teaching in Tibetan schools in Qinghai as of Sept. 21, 2021, with a greater emphasis on classes in written Chinese and basic Chinese speaking abilities, according to RFA’s source.
“Many Tibetan parents are concerned about these changes and the policies being implemented by the Chinese government, but they have no way to do anything about them,” he said.
In August, two Tibetan students identified as Gyuldrak and Yangrik, both 19, were held by Qinghai authorities in Golog’s Darlag (Dari) county for protesting plans to utilize the Chinese language as the only medium of instruction in Tibetan schools, sources informed RFA.
According to sources, the policy has already sparked widespread opposition among Tibetans in neighboring Sichuan, where Tibetan private schools have been closed and children have been sent to government schools due to parents’ concerns about their children’s connection to their native language and culture.
