Chinese government in
Lhasa forcefully removed Tibetan families from their ancestor homes in Lhundup
(Ch: Lhunzhub) county of Lhasa municipality, in so called Tibetan Autonomous
Region to make way for an extensive mining in the region.
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| Pile of ore deposits at the mining site in Lhundup County |
Several nomadic
families of Dhun viilage in Khartse Township of the Lhundup County have been
forced to move out of their ancestral homes to make way for extensive mining on
their grassland. The mining is being owned and operated by Chinese and local
Tibetans have little idea about the type of mineral being extracted. Some
speculate the extraction of “white gold”.
According to some
studies, this region lies in a north-dipping thrust fault and has deposits of
Zinc (Zn), Lead (Pb), Copper (Cu) and Gold (Ag) formed in stratiform orebody. A
major mining operation is being carried out near Laobadui
or Leqingla (Coordinates: 30.006944°N, 91.065278°E)
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| Mining site in Lhundup County, TAR |
\The mining is causing
socio-cultural and environmental impacts. Local Tibetans have witnessed dumping
of factory waste in the rivers and destruction of grassland resulting into
death of live stocks and decline of farm yield since 2006 when the mining operation
started. The local Tibetans reportedly made repeated appeals to the local
authorities but to no avail. Instead the authority deemed their efforts as
politically motivated and ignored the real issues. Under such circumstances,
Tibetans are left with almost no scope to express their grievances.
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