FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 22nd, 2009

Click Here to view photos from SFT's September 21st, 2009 protest at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel.

TIBETANS, SUPPORTERS PROTEST CHINESE PRESIDENT AT UNITED NATIONS China’s failed policies causing environmental crisis in Tibet; threaten Asian security

New York – Hundreds of Tibetans and their supporters are protesting at the United Nations General Assembly building today where Chinese President Hu Jintao is attending the Summit on Climate Change with global leaders. This is Hu Jintao's first visit to the U.N. since widespread protests against Chinese rule erupted across Tibet in March 2008. Reports from Tibet today indicate that the Chinese government has once again closed parts of Tibet to foreign tourists until after the sensitive October 1st anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China.

As China presents itself as a leader in the fight to stop climate change, Tibetan rights groups point to 60 years of failed Chinese government land-use policies in Tibet that have caused desertification on the grasslands, acute and chronic flooding in eastern China from clear-cutting Tibet's forests, and poisoned river and groundwater through unregulated mining. Tibetans and campaigners are particularly concerned about China's ongoing policy of forcibly settling Tibetan nomadic communities, even as scientific research on Tibet's nomads, including by Chinese scientists, shows that traditional nomadic land use actually promotes the ecological health of the grassland ecosystems and water resources.

"The environmental catastrophe being faced by Tibetans, Chinese and all those people in Asia living downstream of Tibet's great rivers is the direct result of the Chinese government's disastrous land use and economic development policies,” said Lhadon Tethong, Executive Director of Students for a Free Tibet. “Hu Jintao may present himself and the Chinese Communist Party as the solution to global climate change but in reality they are a major part of the problem and this speech is only a distraction from the growing crisis of legitimacy the Chinese Communist Party is facing in China after sixty years of totalitarian rule."

More than 150 Tibetan rights groups have appealed to United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon and world leaders to press China on the growing environmental crisis in Tibet at today’s Summit and in the lead up to the Climate Summit in Copenhagen this December. 

“Today, President Hu Jintao is trying to win the world's favor by addressing global climate change at the United Nations, but Tibetans know the true reality of China’s politically motivated and destructive environmental policies, and we call on people of conscience to speak up for Tibet’s nomads, the stewards of Tibet’s fragile ecosystem,” said Tenden Dechen, Executive Coordinator with the Tibetan Youth Congress.

Tibetans and their supporters will also protest tomorrow, September 23rd, from 9am-5pm at Dag Hammerskold Plaza when Hu Jintao will address the United Nations General Assembly, the first time a Chinese President has spoken at the U.N. in more than 30 years. 

-30-