(TibetanReview.net, Jun08’19) – Chinese authorities have been expelling monks and nuns from a sprawling monastic study complex in Palyul (Chinese: Baiyu) County of Karze (Ganzi) Prefecture in Sichuan Province over the past one month or so, with the move still underway, reported the Tibetan Service of rfa.org Jun 7. The expulsions target those who do not belong to the local area.
The Yachen Gar Tibetan Buddhist study centre, founded in 1985, had a student population of around 10,000 monks, nuns and laypeople at one time.
That was when in Aug 2017 the authorities, said to have been acting under orders from Beijing, began demolishing some 2,000 dwellings of monks and nuns, with their residents being expelled for not belonging to the local area.
The current move was said to have started in the beginning of last year with a large number of Chinese officials arriving at the centre to collect information on its residents, recording their names and ages, their places of origin, and their monastic affiliation.
It is not clear how many students are affected by the current move which is said to be still underway.
A similar centre in neighbouring Serta (Seda) County had met a similar fate, with reports suggesting that during 2017-18, at least 4,820 Tibetan and Chinese monks and nuns were removed from the Larung Gar Buddhist Academy, with over 7,000 dwellings and other structures being torn down since 2001.
The two centres had attracted students not only from mainland China as well but also from numerous other countries. Both are situated in remote locations.
