28/11/2013 – T.I.
- More than half a century of occupation by China against the Tibetan people has unleashed a wave of immolations as a symbol of protest.
- "La única forma de reivindicarse que les queda es dejar de existir, una muestra de impotencia hacia las violaciones que sufren".
More than half a century of repression and occupation: no freedom of expression, unable to express, practice your religion or preserve your culture. Definitely, without being able to express their identity as a people. This is the feeling that dominates hundreds of Tibetans who, since the Chinese invasion 1959, They have sacrificed themselves to ask for a solution to the conflict.
A phenomenon that has intensified in the last year: about thirty monks They have committed suicide in style or, at least, they have tried. However, it is worth asking, ¿What pushes Tibetans to self-immolate?? ¿What reasons are behind these acts of protest?? "La desesperación", Daniel Pueyo sentence, supporter and collaborator of the Casa del Tibet Foundation. "The only way they have left to vindicate themselves is trying to stop existingr, a show of helplessness towards the human rights violations suffered by its people".
Tibetan nature is difficult to understand from a Western point of view. For a start, violence goes against their culture and religion. They do not conceive it as a means and their protests are always peaceful, as well as their responses to China's aggressions. Nevertheless, five decades of oppression has pushed them to be more vehement.
"Los tibetanos no exteriorizan sus sentimientos y el sufrimiento lo llevan por dentro, con mucha paciencia", Pueyo explains to Teinteresa. So, monks and civilians who self-immolate follow this logic: they don't fight outwards, but they internalize their anguish. El suicidio es un acto de "desesperación natural, una forma de decir 'ya no puedo dar más' for my people, and that is why they direct their actions against themselves", thinks the collaborator of the Casa del Tibet Foundation.
Even so, let no one be fooled, They do not intend to be martyrs. Tibetans believe fervently in reincarnation and death has a different meaning for them.. She further , they consider that behind everything there is a cause and an action: karma. This collective imagination explains why many have made a dramatic decision such as self-immolation..
"The fact that the Dalai Lama is old and the fear that he will never return to Tibet, after more than 50 years exiled, is another reason de que se repitan más a menudo", consider Pueyo, a very personal view on the problem. The Tibetans thus see the best example of Chinese repression in the exile of their leader., who in turn point to him as the instigator of the self-immolations.
"Es una decisión muy personal de cada uno, fruto de su desesperación", the collaborator responds to the accusations, which nevertheless recognizes that a certain contagion effect may have occurred. "Cada suicidio es un navajazo al corazón de los tibetanos pero muchos ya no ven una salida ". A perseverance that has led them to take a new step, historical in view of the antecedents, although small towards a final solution.
Tibet has lost faith in the world, but not in its cause. To desperate situations, desperate solutions.
