US hits China with visa curbs over ‘forced assimilation’ of children in Tibet

The United States is set to impose visa sanctions on Chinese officials involved in the “forced assimilation” of children in Tibet. This move comes as a response to the separation of approximately one million children from their families in Tibet, according to UN experts.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced that the US would limit visas for Chinese officials responsible for the state boarding school policy, despite ongoing high-level discussions between the two nations, reported AFP.

Blinken stated that these measures were aimed at countering the coercive policies that are attempting to erode the unique linguistic, cultural, and religious heritage of Tibet among its younger generations.

He called on the authorities of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to halt the practice of coercing Tibetan children into government-run boarding schools and to discontinue assimilation policies not only in Tibet but also in other parts of the PRC.

According to a spokesperson from the US State Department, the new visa restrictions would apply to both current and former officials involved in education policy in Tibet. However, specific details were not provided due to US confidentiality laws regarding visa records.

In a separate move, the US had previously imposed sanctions in December on Wu Yingjie and Zhang Hongbo, two senior Chinese officials, in response to alleged widespread human rights abuses in Tibet.

The statement from Blinken referred to a report by three UN experts in February that estimated around one million Tibetan children had been forcibly placed into boarding schools.

This program seems to have the objective of assimilating Tibetans into China’s predominant Han culture, with a mandatory focus on Mandarin education and the absence of instruction aligned with the cultural practices of the Buddhist-majority Himalayan region, as stated by special rapporteurs.

Additionally, a report released by UN experts earlier in the year highlighted that hundreds of thousands of Tibetans had been coerced into leaving their traditional rural lifestyles for “vocational training” of low significance, as a pretext to undermine their distinct identity.

The Chinese foreign ministry dismissed these reports as baseless, asserting that the Tibet region enjoys stability, economic progress, ethnic harmony, and religious accord.

With inputs from agencies

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