(TibetanReview.net, Apr22’23) – Following condemnations of the programme by a number of UN human rights experts, the government of Germany has on Apr 20 called on China to end its coercive boarding school system under which Tibetan children are removed from their parents and cultural environment to be molded as Chinese-speaking and Chinese-cultured citizens loyal to the Communist Party of China. It has also called for an end to its programme of forced resettlement of Tibetan nomads.
Taking part in a session of the Bundestag’s Committee on Human Rights and Humanitarian Aid, a federal government representative has expressed concern over the “increasingly deteriorating human rights situation in Tibet” and stated that “as part of their policy of assimilation directed against the Tibetan language, culture and religion, the Chinese authorities systematically violated human rights.”
The German government’s statement came after the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights had adopted recommendations following its review of China’s record earlier this February which called for an immediate end to the residential school system in Tibet and the forced resettlements being carried out there.
Giving a presentation on China’s ongoing gross violations of human rights in Tibet, the German foreign office representative has emphasized that the issues are not “lost sight of” by Berlin.
However, when asked by MPs from the CDU/CSU parliamentary group and from Bündnis 90/Die Grünen, he did not want to confirm whether Germany’s Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock had specifically discussed Tibet during her last trip to China or at the most recent G7 summit held in Japan.