Two Tibetan documentary filmmakers held for past six months in Tibet

Wednesday, 17 September 2008

Reporters Without Borders calls on the Chinese authorities to release Dhondup Wangchen, who made a documentary about Tibet, and Jigme Gyatso, his friend and camera assistant. They have been unjustly detained since March 2008 for filming interviews with Tibetans, above all in the Amdo region of Tibet.

"The case of Wangchen and Gyatso is a tragic example of what happens when Tibetans take the risk of trying to interview people about the situation in the province," Reporters Without Borders said. "The Chinese government decided to reopen Tibet to foreign tourists, and now it must show clemency towards those who have been detained solely because of what they or others said."

Wangchen’s wife, Lhamo Tso, told Reporters Without Borders that she still does not know exactly why they are being held. A resident of the northern Indian city of Dharamsala, Tso said her husband was reticent about the purpose of his proposed long trip when he set off for Tibet in October 2007. After losing touch, she was told at the end of March that Wangchen and Gyatso were arrested on 23 March in the Siling area.

The film produced from what Wangchen and Gyatso filmed is a 25-minute documentary entitled Leaving Fear Behind (www.leavingfearbehind.com). It shows Tibetans in the Amdo region expressing their views on the Dalai Lama, the Olympic Games and Chinese legislation. Wangchen managed to send his videocassettes out of Tibet before he and Gyatso were arrested. Neither of their families has had any news of them for the past five and a half months.

Wangchen was born in the Amdo region in 1974. A Buddhist monk, Gyatso is from the Kham region.

Tso told Reporters Without Borders that her husband has always been "a very active man who has always wanted to do something for Tibet." Before his arrest, Wangchen said: "It is very difficult for Tibetans to go to Beijing and express themselves freely. This is why we decided to show the real feelings of the Tibetan people in a documentary."

Screened for foreign journalists in Beijing during the Olympic Games, the documentary shows Tibetans expressing their disillusionment with the erosion and marginalisation of the Tibetan language and culture, the destruction of the nomadic lifestyle by forced resettlement, the lack of religious freedom and attacks on the Dalai Lama, and the Chinese government’s broken promises before the Olympic Games to improve the situation in Tibet.

In Dharamsala, Tso has to take care not only of her four children but also her husband’s parents. "I get up in the night to bake bread which I myself then sell," she said. "I feel the pressure mentally more than physically (...) I have to cope with a lot of difficulties but the biggest problem is the fact that my husband is in prison."

Tso said her husband was aware of the risks he was running when he made the documentary. "Yes, he knew," she said. "But that does not mean he does not love his family and his parents. He did it for the Tibetan people and Tibet."

Ngawang Choephel, a Tibetan ethnomusicologist and documentary filmmaker, was released on "medical grounds" from Chengdu prison in China in 2002 after being held for six years. He had been given an 18-year-sentence on charges of subversion, spying and counter-revolutionary activities.

Dhondup Wangchen was born on 17th October 1974 in Bayen in the Tsoshar region of Amdo, the northeastern province of Tibet (in Chinese: Hualong, Haidong, Qinghai). Born into a farming family, he received no formal education. As a young man, he moved to Lhasa where he was awakened to the grave existential threat faced by the Tibetan people. In 1993 Dhondup Wangchen and his cousin Gyaljong Tsetrin made an arduous journey out of Tibet to India, traveling on foot over 5,000 meter passes to meet the Dalai Lama. Soon thereafter, both returned to Tibet further motivated to work for the benefit of the Tibetan people. Tsetrin was forced to finally flee Tibet in 2002 and received political asylum in Switzerland. Wangchen remained in Tibet. Leaving Fear Behind (in Tibetan, Jigdrel) began as a collaboration between the two cousins in 2007 – Wangchen in Tibet, and Tsetrin in Switzerland.

The film was shot entirely in Tibet by Wangchen assisted by his friend Jigme Gyatso, also known as Golog Jigme. Jigme Gyatso was born in 1969 in Golog Serta, in the Kardze region of Kham (in Chinese: Ganzi, Sichuan). He was a Tibetan Buddhist monk in Labrang Monastery in Gansu Province. Wangchen and Gyatso began as complete amateurs, with no camera experience, but with extraordinary determination and courage. They covered thousands of miles on motorbike and overcame innumerable hurdles, all to bring the unheard voices of ordinary Tibetans to the world stage. For the filmmakers, revealing their identities was always a part of the plan. Fully aware of the risks they took, they rejected anonymity as an option. In order for the film to be made, fear had to be truly set aside. Both Dhondup Wangchen and Golog Jigme are now in detention. They were detained shortly after concluding filming in March 2008. Please go to TAKE ACTION to publicize their cases and secure their release. During the project, Dhondup assumed a code name: Jigme – which means "fearless" in Tibetan. His code name inspired the film’s title: Leaving Fear Behind (in Tibetan, Jigdrel).

DHONDUP WANGCHEN, IN HIS OWN WORDS:

The idea of our film is not to get famous or to give entertainment. But at a time of great difficulty and a feeling of helplessness, it is for us to show such a film to get some meaningful response and results. It is very difficult [for Tibetans] to go to Beijing and speak out there. So that is why we decided to show the real feelings of Tibetans inside Tibet through this film.