Tibetan govt in exile to issue map of Tibet to counter China’s ‘cartographic aggression’

The Tibetan government-in-exile will issue a map of Tibet based on historical records, with original boundaries and names of places, to counter China’s “cartographic aggression” and practice of renaming locations to assert its claim over disputed territories.

The Central Tibetan Administration (CTA), based in Dharamshala, will use several research studies by experts on Tibet and ancient maps to come up with the map which will be made available online for Tibetans and academics around the world, said Penpa Tsering, the Sikyong or political leader of the government-in-exile.

“We are doing this so that Tibetans living around the world get to know the real history of their country, and so that the memories of the Tibetans living inside Tibet don’t fade away in the face of China’s cartographic aggression,” Tsering told HT.

“This is the overall Chinese strategy, it’s nothing new. Renaming [of places] has happened before with Tibet. They did it last year too. If you look at the overall Chinese strategy, they use only Chinese names for [territories they claim, such as] Senkaku Islands of Japan, or islands near Taiwan or Spratly Islands in the South China Sea,” said Tsering, who like most of the current Tibetan leadership in exile was born in India and has never been to Tibet.

“The Chinese have their own names for islands they claim, not the names coined by other countries. They have also done something similar in Arunachal Pradesh. Within China, they are trying to erase the historical background of these names.”

The CTA will work with a Tibetan cartographer based in Stanford to develop the searchable map of Tibet and the work is expected to be completed in six months to a year, Tsering said. “We will then make it available online for everyone, otherwise there is no reason to have this map. It will provide a complete picture of Tibet,” he said.

Another project taken up by the CTA is developing a search engine with Tibetan names of places. “Now, if I go to Google, I can’t recognise names or places inside Tibet. We’re going to do research on names of every place inside Tibet, and their Tibetan origins,” Tsering said.

Chinese authorities have forcibly relocated 500 villages with more than 140,000 residents in the Tibet Autonomous Region since 2016, according to a recent report by Human Rights Watch. They have also renamed scores of places across the ancient kingdom of Tibet.

In addition to renaming Tibet as Xizang and creating the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) in 1965, Chinese authorities included several regions of the ancient kingdom of Tibet in Chinese provinces. For instance, Tibetan officials pointed out, the region of Amdo is now part of Qinghai province, Kham region was included in Sichuan province, and some other areas were made part of Yunnan province.

The map being created by the CTA will address such historical issues, and Tsering said he believes other countries facing similar problems with China too should push back.

“Countries with disputes in the South China Sea and in the case of the Senkaku Islands – everyone should push back against their designs. Because these designs amplify China’s hegemonistic ambitions despite their denials,” he said.

China refers to the northeastern Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh as “Zangnan” and claims the strategic region as part of South Tibet. In recent years, China has renamed dozens of towns and geographical features in Arunachal Pradesh as part of its efforts to assert its claim on the region. The Indian side has rubbished such moves and said the state will always be a part of the country.

Referring to the Resolve Tibet Act, which was signed by US President Joe Biden on July 12 and seeks to pressure China for a negotiated settlement of Tibet’s demand for greater autonomy, Tsering said: “The main issue is that we were trying to push against China’s disinformation on Tibetan history. [The Act] says the US doesn’t recognize China’s assertion that Tibet has been part of China since ancient times.”