Wife of Injured Pro-Tibet Activist Assails Chinese Jailers' Conduct
World Tibet Network NewsSaturday, September 4, 1999 |
2. Wife of Injured Pro-Tibet Activist Assails Chinese Jailers' Conduct (WP)
By Pamela Ferdinand Special to The Washington Post
September 4, 1999; Page A22
BOSTON, Sept. 3 - The wife of an American scholar and activist who suffered
severe injuries while in the custody of Chinese officials expressed outrage
at their conduct and appealed today for help in obtaining the release of
her husband's translator from detention in China.
Daja Meston, 29, an advocate for Tibet from Newton, Mass., remains in fair
condition at Brigham and Women's Hospital, several weeks after jumping from
a third-floor hotel room in a remote area of China where he was
interrogated for at least three days by state security personnel.
Meston, who received medical treatment in Hong Kong before returning to the
United States this week, suffered a broken back, heel fractures and severe
internal injuries from the fall, which Chinese authorities said was part of
an attempt to escape. He is steadily recovering and eventually will walk
again, doctors said today. A fund has been established to cover his medical
expenses, which so far exceed $100,000.
In the meantime, Meston's wife--who with her husband has been a vocal
opponent of Chinese policies in Tibet--said he remains traumatized by the
ordeal and has shared few details of what transpired.
"What they did to him was inhumane and appalls me," said Phuntsok Meston,
who traveled to China to help arrange her husband's release and spoke
publicly about the incident for the first time during a news conference
outside the hospital here this morning. "My biggest concern right now is
his health. I know he has a lot of nightmares, and he can't sleep very
well."
Timothy McNeill, a childhood friend, said Meston appeared very frail. His
mood, McNeill said, "was a combination of relief and lingering terror. He
told me he didn't feel safe until he saw Phuntsok."
Meston, who grew up in a Tibetan monastery in Nepal and is fluent in
Tibetan, went to China in late July to conduct an independent inspection of
the proposed site of a World Bank resettlement program. Tibetan groups
oppose the project, which would move 58,000 poor farmers into an area
dominated by Tibetan and Mongolian herdsmen, because they say it would
dilute their population and harm the environment. The World Bank has
decided to delay the funding.
The Massachusetts scholar was detained Aug. 15 in the remote region, along
with an Australian colleague and their interpreter, on charges that they
conducted illegal research and took photographs in a restricted zone. The
Australian was freed unharmed, but the whereabouts of the guide, Tsering
Dorjee, 26, a Chinese citizen, are unknown.
Dorjee's condition remains Meston's "greatest worry," his wife told more
than a dozen Tibetan advocates gathered here today with flags and blue
"Free Tsering Dorjee" posters in support of their friend inside the
hospital and their countryman thousands of miles away.
"If it can happen to an American citizen, imagine what is happening to
Tibetans there," said Jampa Palsang, 29, a local restaurant owner.
Addressing the crowd in traditional Tibetan dress tied with a colorful
pangden, a woven apron that denotes marriage, Phuntsok Meston said her
husband's knowledge of Tibetan culture and spirituality might have been
perceived as a threat by Chinese authorities, even though they had opened
access to the proposed resettlement area.
Articles in this Issue:
- Wife of Injured Pro-Tibet Activist Assails Chinese Jailers' Conduct (WP)
- Dates of Future Kalachakra Initiations
- Lifting the bamboo curtain (SMH)
posted by American Tibetan Nomads at 7:10 AM
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