In late February, NYU Prague students had the unique opportunity to meet Nyima Lhamo, the 26-year old niece of a Tibetan lama who died in a Chinese prison in 2015. Ms. Lhamo, who fled Tibet in 2016,  was in Prague on an advocacy visit to tell the story of her uncle’s death.

Her uncle was Trulku Tenzin Delek Rinpoche, a Tibetan activist and community leader who promoted Tibetan culture and was often critical of Chinese policies. In 2002, he was sentenced to life imprisonment on charges of terrorism and inciting separatism in the Sichuan Province (charges which he and his supporters denied)  He died in 2015 at age 65, thirteen years into his prison sentence.  Chinese media sited the cause of death as a heart attack, but no death certificate has been issued and there are many questions surrounding his death.

Ms. Lhamo escaped to India in July 2016, a year after her uncle’s death, leaving her 6-year old daughter behind.  She fled China so she could appeal to the international community to pressure China to investigate Rinpoche’s conviction and death. Before escaping, she and her mother were detained by the Chinese authorities for 18 days in Chengdu on charges for “leaking state secrets to the outside world.”

The event was organized in collaboration with the Forum 2000 Foundation, founded by the late Czech President Vaclav Havel, and the human rights organization People in Need.