(TibetanReview.net, Jul01’20) – A primary school teacher in Tibet Autonomous Region has remained disappeared ever since authorities took her away in 2016 for making Facebook postings of overseas media reports about the situation in her occupied homeland. Her case has been tracked by Chinese activists, reported dailymail.co.uk Jun 30.
Ms Mei Duo (Tibetan: Metog?) was stated to have used computer software (apparently a VPN) to bypass China’s ‘Great Firewall’ to access the banned social media platform to inform her friends about the truth of the situation in Tibet, the report said, citing a website tracking the whereabouts of Chinese activists.
The report cited Wei Quan Net, a blog run by Chinese human rights campaigners, as saying Mei Duo was taken away by Chinese authorities in 2016 and kept in secret detention for ‘disclosing national secrets’.
The report called her the first ethnic Tibetan to ‘be forced to disappear’ by Chinese authorities for defying the nation’s strict internet rules.
Wei Quan Net has said Mei Duo had used Facebook to share Chinese-language stories about Tibet from US-based Radio Free Asia and Norway-based Voice of Tibet.
She was reported to have hoped that her posts could help those who used Facebook in China, particularly her Han friends, to learn about the issues being faced by Tibet.
The campaigners have said Beijing’s officials launched a persecution against her after being informed of her Facebook posts while the primary school she was working for also sacked her.
The charge against Mei Duo was said to mainly target civil servants who had deliberately or accidentally leaked classified information. It carries a maximum prison term of seven years under Chinese Criminal Law.
The news about her situation was stated to have become known shortly after a journalist was arrested for similar reasons. Zhang Zhan, a reporter from Shanghai, shared on YouTube and Twitter a couple of news stories about Covid-19 in Wuhan.
There is, however, no further information about her and where she is being held. Radio Free Asia, a news source for her, was stated to have reported on her case.
