(TibetanReview.net, Oct16, 2018) – Chinese President Xi Jinping has on Oct 15 congratulated the Xizang Minzu University, or Tibet University for Nationalities, on the 60th anniversary of its founding. Xi urged the university to fully implement the Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era and the spirit of the 19th CPC National Congress, promote core socialist values, and improve education quality, reported China’s official Xinhua news agency Oct 15.
Complimenting the university for having trained a large number of cadres and professionals for the development of Tibet, Xi has also called on the university to carry out the Party’s ethnic and religious policies, raise awareness of ethnic unity and progress, pass on fine traditional Chinese culture and safeguard ethnic harmony.
Underlying these seemingly benign calls are repressive implementation policies that have seen all sorts of brutal human rights violations and moves towards what is seen as the decimation of Tibetan identity.
The report said the Xizang Minzu University, located in Xianyang of northwest China’s Shaanxi Province, was founded by the CPC Central Committee as the first inland-based institution of higher education for Tibet after its so-called peaceful liberation.
The university is said to have over 9,400 full-time students, more than half of them being members of ethnic minorities, including Tibetans, and 1,105 faculty members. The university is said to offer 42 undergraduate majors and 20 master’s programmes.
The university’s notable alumnis have been said to include Basang (born 1937), former Vice-Chairwoman of Tibet Autonomous Region; Losang Jamcan, a recent former Chairman of Tibet Autonomous Region, Tashi Tsering, an educator and an early returnee from exile who passed away recently, and Wu Yingjie, the current boss of the Tibet Autonomous Region.