Tibetans in China and abroad have started a boycott of the Tibetan New Year (Losar) fortnight, which started on February25, 2009. They are observing the fortnight as a period of mourning in homage to the Tibetans who were killed by the Chinese security forces during the uprising in the Tibetan-inhabited areas of China in March and April last year. Their observance of the period of mourning consisted of prayers and processions. In some places, they also burnt the effigies of the Chinese leaders in keeping with the Tibetan tradition of burning the effigies of demons during the New Year.
In the Qinghai province, over 100 Tibetan monks of the Lutsang monastery took out a silent procession in the Mangra ( the Chinese call it Guinan) county on February 25,2009. The procession terminated at the country centre, where the local Government offices are located. They presented a petition to a representative of the local Government calling, inter alia, for an international enquiry into the violent incidents of last year. The petition also appealed to the Chinese leaders to respect the wishes and feelings of the Tibetan youth. After observing silence for 30 minutes at the county centre, they went back to their monastery peacefully. The local Chinese authorities did not try to prevent the procession and accepted their petition.
However, on February 26,2009, vans of the Public Security Bureau went round the county asking the leaders of the procession to surrender to the police and the local population to help the police in the identification and arrest of the leaders. They warned of legal action against those not carrying out the orders and not co-operating with the police. A few hours later, a contingent of the People's Armed Police (PAP) raided the monastery and took away a number of monks for interrogation at the police station.
The Chinese authorities in Tibet and other areas having a large Tibetan population organised singing and dancing in public squares and street plays, showing how the Chinese vanquished serfdom and what was portrayed as the feudal rule of the Dalai Lama. A large number of Han Chinese living and working in these areas attended the State-sponsored celebrations, which were largely boycotted by the Tibetans despite the payment of a cash gift by the Chinese to Tibetans attending the celebrations. However, there are no reports of the Chinese forcing the Tibetans to attend the celebrations, which could have led to violence.
Coinciding with the beginning of the New Year fortnight, the Chinese authorities suspended the issue of permission to foreign tourists and journalists to visit Tibet and the Tibetan-inhabited areas. They have indicated that this ban could continue till the end of March.
However, Edward Wong of the International Herald Tribune managed to visitQinghai--presumably with a permit issued by the Chinese before the imposition of the temporary ban. His despatch, which was carried by the IHT on February 25,2009, stated as follows: "The most prominent act of Tibetan resistance to Chinese rule since an uprising last March, unfolded quietly in towns across western China on Wednesday (February 25), as monks, nomads and merchants refrained from holding festivities and instead used the occasion of Losar to memorialize Tibetans who suffered in China's military crackdown last year. Many Tibetans forsook dancing and dinner parties for the lighting of yak-butter lamps and the chanting of prayers. The result of a grassroots campaign that began months ago, the boycott of Losar signifies the discontent that many of China's six million Tibetans still feel toward domination by the ethnic Han Chinese nearly one year after the uprising and almost six decades after Mao Zedong's troops seized control of the high deserts and grasslands of Tibet.