Tibetan body president meets supporters on Europe journey
President of the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) Sikyong Penpa Tsering, who is on a tour of Europe, has met Tibetan support groups to strengthen support for the cause of Tibet.
He interacted with members of the Foreign Affairs Committee at the Dutch Parliament Building. The meeting was attended by Jesse Klaver, committee chairman, along with other members. Sikyong also called Wim Geerts, the Dutch Ambassador for Human Rights, who had previously expressed serious concerns regarding the violent arrest of Tibetans in Derge (China) and advocated for their release.
At the Hague Centre for Strategic Studies, Sikyong engaged in a discussion with the centre’s political director Han ten Broek and senior project manager Berend Kwak. Ten young scholars of the centre also participated in the meeting, during which the gathering held discussion on the global significance of the Tibetan plateau, particularly its vital water resources and their implications for riparian communities, as well as the prospects for Sino-India and India-Tibet relations.
Sikyong concluded the engagements in the Hague with an informal meeting with coalitions of key NGOs, including representatives of Uyghur, Southern Mongolia, Hong Kong, International Campaign for Tibet, Student’s for Free Tibet, and members of the Tibetan community. The meeting underscored a shared commitment to uphold human rights and humanitarian cooperation.
In Luxembourg, Sikyong held significant meeting with members of the Green Party. Notwithstanding Luxembourg’s financial ties with China, as evident by the presence of several banks of China in the city and hesitation of few parliamentarians to meet the political leader, members of the Green Party were open to engaging in a dialogue with Sikyong, the CTA spokesperson said.
Sam Tanson, former Minister of Justice and current Member of Parliament, along with Djuna Bernard, member of the Luxembourg Chamber of Deputies, held a meeting with Sikyong at their office. The meeting proved to be highly productive with Sikyong offering a thorough overview of the current situation in Tibet, highlighting the severe restrictions faced by Tibetans inside Tibet, which led to extreme acts of protest such as self-immolation, the CTA spokesperson said.
Sikyong emphasised that Tibet was not the socialist paradise China claims it to be. He gave consecutive interviews to journalists from two prominent Luxembourg media outlets — Julian Dorr from Tageblatt, and Cordula Schnuer, the editor-in-chief from the Luxembourg Times, — the CTA spokesperson said.
