BEIJING, Aug. 20 -- A frail and aging Tibetan monk who presides over one of China’s largest and most important centers of Buddhist teaching appears to have been removed from his remote mountain complex, a monitoring group said today. The action came as Chinese authorities pressed ahead with a campaign to expel thousands of followers who had spontaneously gathered there.
Khenpo Jigme Phuntsog, 68, a charismatic monk reputed to be the reincarnation of the teacher of the 13th Dalai Lama, the predecessor of the current Dalai Lama, was confined to his residence in June when the government began trying to force as many as 5,000 monks and nuns to leave his Serthar religious academy, located in the isolated Larung valley in China's western Sichuan province.
But reports received by the London-based Tibet Information Network in the past few days indicate Chinese authorities have since taken Khenpo Jigme away from the sprawling monastic encampment for medical treatment at a clinic outside the valley. He had originally refused to leave the complex, the group said, and his departure could make it easier now for the government to clear away his students.
According to new accounts obtained from witnesses, some of whom have fled China, as many as half of the 3,000 nuns at the Serthar complex have already been forced to leave, some after being ordered to denounce the Dalai Lama, the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader, the group said. Many of the women are poor and may have nowhere else to go.
At the same time, other monks and nuns have threatened to commit suicide rather than leave Serthar, which had housed the largest concentration of monks and nuns in Tibetan areas and expanded over the years as new arrivals built their own accommodations, the group said.
New photographs from the region show construction workers tearing down these homes, primarily crude shacks and huts that cover the slopes of the valley surrounding the institute. One photo shows a nun gathering her belongings from the wreckage. The group said more than 1,000 dwellings have been demolished since mid-June.
Monitoring groups, witnesses and other sources say the United Front Work Department, a Communist Party organization that manages relations with religious groups, is directing the clampdown. An estimated 6,000 to 7,000 monks and nuns lived at Serthar, and the department's goal is to reduce the population to 1,000 monks and 400 nuns by October, these sources said.
The timing of the crackdown could complicate relations with the United States during President Bush's October visit to China. The Bush administration has said pressing for greater religious freedom will be a priority in its dealings with Beijing. China is in the midst of a nationwide squeeze on religion, jailing thousands of followers of the banned Falun Gong spiritual movement, razing hundreds of Christian churches and arresting Catholic clergy loyal to the Vatican.
Government officials did not answer their phones or return calls today, but an official with the Sichuan Religious Affairs Bureau said in June that monks and nuns were being forced to leave the academy "because of concerns about social stability and at the order of central authorities."
The Tibet Information Network linked the expulsions to Khenpo Jigme's popularity and to the ethnic and geographic diversity of Serthar's nuns and monks, about 1,000 of whom are members of China's ethnic Han majority. It quoted one monk from Serthar who recently arrived in exile suggesting the government was worried about the influence of Tibetan Buddhism on educated Chinese from the nation's cities.