A 25-year-old Tibetan monk has been murdered in custody. The International Campaign for Tibet reports (March 24, 2026):
On December 18, 2025, local police in Shongshan Tibetan Township, in…Qinghai Province, returned Samten’s body to the monastery, claiming he “suddenly fell ill” and died during an unsuccessful emergency transfer to an unspecified hospital. However, local sources suspect that Samten was beaten to death during interrogation by Chinese officials.
Upon returning his remains in 2025, Chinese authorities ordered the monks not to disclose any information regarding Samten’s death. The current situation of Samten’s family remains unknown. Owing to Chinese authorities’ severe restrictions on access to information, when and for what reasons Samten was taken into police custody are currently unknown.
So this is news without any facts except the corpse and the history of CCP treatment of Tibetans and Samten. ICT says that it believes “that Samten had been under constant police surveillance since 2021.”
That year, he was detained for sharing photographs on the Chinese social media platform WeChat related to the democratic elections of the Central Tibetan Administration, the government-in-exile of the Tibetan people….
Samten’s death comes in the aftermath of an intensified campaign of oppression leading up to the 14th Dalai Lama’s 90th birthday in July 2025. Chinese authorities raided monasteries to confiscate images of the Dalai Lama, conducted mandatory “political education” sessions, harassed and intimidated monks and monastic leaders and detained Tibetans in widespread crackdowns. As ICT reported previously, Chinese authorities’ repression drove 52-year-old Shersang Gyatso of Tsang Monastery to commit suicide in August 2025.
In contrast, a 90-year-old man named Wang Chuanwen, of the Shandong province, is still alive, so far, after getting sentenced to two years in prison for being a practitioner of Falun Gong.
Last August, he made the mistake of talking about his beliefs to fellow passengers on a bus, and one of the passengers snitched on him. Police came to his home, arrested him, interrogated him, and tried to detain him. But medical tests showed that he had lousy blood pressure, in consideration of which “the local detention center would not admit him.” Not the end of the matter. After Wang was released on bail, the prosecution and persecution continued, and eventually he was sentenced to two years in prison and fined 3,000 yuan.
“Again, his health prevented the authorities from enforcing the sentence. The prison refused to accept him due to his dangerously high blood pressure, and he was placed under house arrest instead.”
So this fragile 90-year-old is lucky, sort of. He can live at home instead of in a jail cell. But he is all the same being subjected to great restrictions and suffering continuing stress that probably doesn’t help his blood pressure. For having a conversation on a bus.
