Sangyip Sangyip can be reached by driving northeast from Lhasa for about ten minutes. Sangyip's Brigade #5 was reported to have 2,000 Tibetan prisoners, the overwhelming majority being political.37 Tinley Chophel (Dharamsala, 11/4/88), a 25 year-old monk from Sera Monastery arrested for participating in the March 5, 1988 demonstration, was in Sangyip for several weeks. He confirmed that most of the inmates there are political prisoners in contrast to Gutsa which has many common criminals. Utitod Utitod is a medium or minimum security prison that lies adjacent to Sangyip and could be considered part of the Sangyip complex. However, since it is referred to as a separate facility by those who have been interned there, we have included it here as such. After two weeks in Gutsa prison, Lobsang Dhondup was moved to Utitod prison, where he was put in a cell with 20 other monks who had also been arrested on March 5, 1988. In his building Lobsang counted 15 cells, eight of which were occupied. He thought that his building was for inmates with indefinite terms, and that the three other buildings were for fixed term prisoners. Former liceman Thapkey Dorje said that Utitod held 300 to 500 people and was used primarily for political prisoners. Titchu Several interviewees also told us of Titchu prison in Shigatse, Tibet's second largest city located on the road between Lhasa and Kathmandu. Tenzin Samphel (Dharamsala, 12/2/88), a 24 year-old peddler from northeastern Tibet who was caught trying to flee to Nepal, estimated that there were 60 to 70 prisoners at Titchu, all of whom had been caught trying to cross the border or handed over by Nepalese border guards. Five or six prisoners were Chinese and the rest were Tibetan. All were relatively young men and many were monks. 37 John Avedon, Tibet Today: Current Conditions and Prospects (London: Wisdom Publications, 1988), p.23. Maintenance of Prisoners Food All of those interviewed stated that the food provided in prison was insufficient and nutritionally inadequate. Sonam Tsering (Dharamsala, 11/25/88), a 20 year-old monk from Sera Monastery gave the following account. His day in Sangyip began at 6:00 when the guards woke everyone up. Sometimes they told him that it was an interrogation day, and he would then have little time to get prepared. If it was not an interrogation day, breakfast would come at 8:00, consisting of a half-filled bowl of thin, watery rice porridge which appeared through a hole in the door. At 1:00 the prisoners were served lunch one ladle of boiled vegetables and steamed bread. Dinner was the same as lunch, except that it did not always arrive. Sonam lost weight rapidly. Sonam, who had also been in Gutsa, said that the food there was much worse than in Sangyip. Often there were no vegetables and no bread. Each day he was fed two momos (steamed dumplings) in the morning and two more at night. Some days, however, he received no food at all. Moreover, water was in scarce supply. One morning Sonam heard the voice of Yulo Dawa Tsering in the cell next door, whom he had known before they were both imprisoned. Yulo sounded very weak. He was saying that he was very thirsty and had not been able to sleep all night. 39 Tenzin Samphel (Dharamsala, 12/2/88) said that in Shigatse's Titchu prison the food was so old and rotten that it gave off an overpowering stench. In Utitod prison, according to Lobsang Dhondup (Dharamsala, 12/3/88), the fixed term prisoners got more food and water and tried to share it with the temporary prisoners but risked severe punishment if they were caught. The easiest way for them to slip food into a cell was when they came to clean the floors of the temporary prisoner building "when a guard wasn't looking." A constant danger was that a Chinese prisoner would tell the guards 38 Yulo Dawa Tsering, perhaps Tibet's best known political prisoner, was sentenced to 14 years for "counter-revolutionary propaganda," and has been adopted as a prisoner of conscience by Amnesty International. Formerly, he was a monk, professor of philosophy and member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC). 39 For further discussion of food, see Amnesty International, "Torture and IllTreatment in Detention of Tibetans Arrested for Alleged Involvement in Proindependence Activities in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR)." London, 1989. Hereafter referred to as AI, "Torture and Ill-Treatment". See also Asia Watch, Human Rights in Tibet (Washington, D.C.:1988), pp. 28-29. 40 Lobsang said that generally, "fixed term prisoners" have been sentenced although that did not mean they had a "trial." Temporary prisoners are generally untried and unsentenced. and get the Tibetans in more trouble. Condition of Cells Cells typically are no more than a cement room with one barred window and a pail. Mattresses are sometimes absent, and often several prisoners have to share one mattress. In October of 1987, when Sonam Tsering was arrested for demonstrating and taken to Sangyip, he was put in a solitary cell measuring 12 x 10 feet. Although Sonam received his own mattress and one quilt, everyone we interviewed who was imprisoned after March of 1988 said that mattresses and blankets were in very short supply and that prisoners shared. Sonam said that each cell in Sangyip had a pail for a toilet. Except when he was taken out for interrogation, he was allowed out of his cell only once a day for several minutes to take his pail and empty it out in the bathroom. About once a week he was allowed to wash, but he never had any soap or a towel. The cell had one window, opposite the door. All he could see was the next building, about 20 feet away. He was shifted between several cells. The first one had a bed; the others did not. One blanket was given to every two prisoners to share. Cells were not heated, and during the winter they became bitterly cold.... is approximately -2° Celsius (28° Fahrenheit). After several months Sonam was moved to Gutsa and kept in darkness for 45 days. His cell had no window and no light bulb. He only saw light once a day when he was let out to use the bathroom or when he was interrogated. From other accounts, it appears that it is more common for a single light bulb to be left on 24 hours a day so that the guards can periodically check up on the prisoners." 41 Lobsang Dhondup (Dharamsala, 12/3/88), was beaten and arrested during the March 5 demonstration. First he was taken to Gutsa, where there were no beds or other fixtures in the cell, only a small tin bucket in which to urinate and a thin rug for him and his eleven cell-mates to sleep on. They were given no blankets. One small window provided light for the cell. Lobsang was moved to Utitod later in March 1988. His cell there had two cement platforms covered with a tarpaulin on which to sleep. One blanket was given to 41 Tibet Information Network (TIN), Int. #4, p.7 & #5, p.3. A series of unpublished interviews was made available to us by TIN in London, after deleting names and other identifying information to protect the confidentiality of those still in Tibet. These interviews of torture victims were carried out in Tibet and are considered to be of the utmost reliability as they were all taped and carefully transcribed. We refer to them as TIN, Int. #1-11. |