Phurbu Tsering Rinpoche (普布泽仁仁波切)
Comments Off on Phurbu Tsering Rinpoche (普布泽仁仁波切)
Phurbu Tsering Rinpoche 普布泽仁仁波切
(released)
*Previously under medical watch
Crime: Illegally owning guns and explosives
Length of Punishment: 8.5 years
Court: Dartsedo (Ch: Kangding) County Intermediate People’s Court, Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province
Trial Date: April 29, 2009
Sentencing Date: December 23, 2009
Dates of Detention/Arrest: May 18, 2008 (detained); arrest date unknown; April 17, 2016 (released)
Date of Birth: January 2, 1957
Medical condition(s): Unknown medical condition, emaciated and weak
Place of Incarceration: Mianyang Prison, Sichuan Province
Background:
Phurbu Tsering Rinpoche served an eight-and-a-half-year sentence on a trumped-up “illegally owning guns and explosives” charge. Rinpoche initially disappeared in May 2008 after a group of nuns held a peaceful protest against a partiotic education campaign in their nunnery in Kardze County. He was forcibly disappeared until his trial, with no official detention, arrest or indictment notices given to his family. Rinpoche’s lawyers, Li Fangping (李方平) and Jiang Tianyong (江天勇), reported Rinpoche had been tortured and forced to confess while he was held incommunicado in 2008. In August 2014, a source of the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy met Rinpoche in prison, and described him as unrecognizable; Rinpoche is weak and emaciated. It is believed that his health has deteriorated due to severe conditions in confinement.
Phurbu Tsering Rinpoche, also known as Pangri-na Rinpoche 布绒朗仁波切, is a highly respected reincarnated Tulku (Living Buddha) of the Tehor Kardze Monastery and the head of the Pangri and Ya-tseg nunneries in Kardze (Ch: Ganzi) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in Sichuan.
*CHRD’s Watch List of Detainees and Prisoners of Conscience in Need of Medical Attention
Further Information
Phurbu Tsering Rinpoche released from prison, April 21, 2016, Free Tibet
Prominent Tibetan religious figure found in emaciated condition in prison, August 28, 2014, TCHRD