CHINA WATCHChina's Anti-COVID Policies in Tibet Trigger Resentment, Online Outcry

By Tsering Kyi

The harsh COVID-19 containment restrictions China is imposing across Tibet are leading to public resentment in the capital of Lhasa, where residents who have tested positive are being quarantined in empty stadiums, schools, warehouses and unfinished buildings.

Beijing’s actions in Tibet reflect the draconian “zero-covid” policy of President Xi Jinping that has caused discontent and even protests in major cities such as Shanghai and Chengdu.

Social media videos from Lhasa show people waiting to be bused at night to an estimated 20 makeshift quarantine camps. For Lhasa residents the “midnight bus” represents their fears of what they may find once they arrive at crowded and locked quarantine sites.

In one social media video shot in the Muslim Wobaling neighborhood, passengers are seen boarding buses parked in front of one of the city’s two mosques.

VOA Tibetan made repeated calls to the Chinese Embassy in Washington for comment but received no response. Xi has made “zero covid” his signature policy for containing the virus with stringent lockdowns and restricted movement, and required testing, tracking and quarantining.

Tibetans, in a rare outburst of open despair, have gone online to Weibo, Douyin and other Chinese social media platforms to draw attention to the situation in the camps that lack adequate hygiene, food and medical care.

Their appeals are remarkable because while the expression of complaints or critical views is risky anywhere in the Chinese state, Tibetans are monitored more heavily and face harsher repercussions than people elsewhere because of the political sensitivity of the region.

In one post, a Tibetan woman said people were being treated like criminals instead of patients. If the authorities are incapable of properly managing these quarantine camps, she said, then they should allow those who test positive to isolate in their homes. “Even if they die, they can at least die in their homes,” she said.

Another Tibetan woman said her husband and her three young children were taken to the Lhasa Beijing Middle School Quarantine Center after her COVID-19 test was inconclusive. Authorities required the entire family to quarantine with 800 people. She said her children developed fevers in the school facility where there were no doctors, medicine or medical treatments.

In a viral audio recording, a Tibetan father pleads with a government official at one of the Lhasa quarantine centers to not separate him from his year-old child. “We were first brought to this quarantine camp even though we tested negative for COVID.