For decades, the Tibetan services of Voice of America (VOA) and Radio Free Asia (RFA) served as lifelines — beacons of truth, piercing the fog of censorship that envelops Tibet. These broadcasts were not mere news bulletins; they were instruments of dignity, connection and resistance. Their recent suspension is not just a bureaucratic decision — it is a moral and strategic failure that must be urgently reversed.
From the snowbound monasteries of Amdo to the refugee settlements of South India, Tibetan listeners tuned in to hear the world speak to them in their own tongue. In a land where information is tightly controlled and history rewritten, VOA and RFA offered unvarnished facts: global events, Tibetan affairs, spiritual teachings and cultural preservation. They were trusted not because they were perfect, but because they were consistent, courageous and rooted in the Tibetan experience.
Inside Tibet, where Chinese state media dominates and surveillance is omnipresent, shortwave broadcasts became a quiet act of defiance. Monks hid radios beneath robes. Farmers listened under starlight. These broadcasts informed Tibetans of His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s travels, international support for human rights and the voices of exiled leaders. They reminded listeners that Tibet was not forgotten — and that truth could still cross borders.
In exile, VOA and RFA helped knit together a scattered people. They offered a shared narrative, a common vocabulary of struggle and hope. For younger generations born in India, Nepal or the West, these broadcasts were bridges to ancestral memory. For elders, they were echoes of a homeland lost, but not erased.
The decision to suspend these services — whether due to budgetary constraints or shifting priorities — betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of their value. In an era of digital saturation, it is tempting to assume that social media and online platforms suffice.
However, in Tibet, where Internet access is filtered and monitored, shortwave remains one of the few reliable conduits of uncensored information. In exile, where identity is fragile and assimilation relentless, Tibetan-language broadcasts are cultural oxygen.
The geopolitical stakes are high. China’s narrative on Tibet is aggressive, well-funded and global. It seeks to portray Tibetan resistance as obsolete, His Holiness as irrelevant and exile as futile. VOA and RFA countered this narrative — not with propaganda, but with pluralism. They offered interviews, debates and stories that reflected the diversity and resilience of the Tibetan people.
To silence these voices is to abandon the very principles that justify their existence: freedom of expression, support for oppressed peoples and the defense of truth. It is to signal to Tibetans — inside and outside — that their story no longer matters. That is unacceptable.
Reinstating VOA and RFA Tibetan broadcasts is not just a technical fix. It is a reaffirmation of commitment. It tells the world that the Tibetan struggle is not a relic, but a living movement. It tells Tibetans that their language, their truth and their dignity still have a place on the global stage.
Let the radios hum again in the highlands. Let the voices return. The world is listening — and so are the Tibetans.
Khedroob Thondup is a former member of the Tibetan parliament-in-exile.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has long been expansionist and contemptuous of international law. Under Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), the CCP regime has become more despotic, coercive and punitive. As part of its strategy to annex Taiwan, Beijing has sought to erase the island democracy’s international identity by bribing countries to sever diplomatic ties with Taipei. One by one, China has peeled away Taiwan’s remaining diplomatic partners, leaving just 12 countries (mostly small developing states) and the Vatican recognizing Taiwan as a sovereign nation. Taiwan’s formal international space has shrunk dramatically. Yet even as Beijing has scored diplomatic successes, its overreach
In her article in Foreign Affairs, “A Perfect Storm for Taiwan in 2026?,” Yun Sun (孫韻), director of the China program at the Stimson Center in Washington, said that the US has grown indifferent to Taiwan, contending that, since it has long been the fear of US intervention — and the Chinese People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) inability to prevail against US forces — that has deterred China from using force against Taiwan, this perceived indifference from the US could lead China to conclude that a window of opportunity for a Taiwan invasion has opened this year. Most notably, she observes that
For Taiwan, the ongoing US and Israeli strikes on Iranian targets are a warning signal: When a major power stretches the boundaries of self-defense, smaller states feel the tremors first. Taiwan’s security rests on two pillars: US deterrence and the credibility of international law. The first deters coercion from China. The second legitimizes Taiwan’s place in the international community. One is material. The other is moral. Both are indispensable. Under the UN Charter, force is lawful only in response to an armed attack or with UN Security Council authorization. Even pre-emptive self-defense — long debated — requires a demonstrably imminent
Since being re-elected, US President Donald Trump has consistently taken concrete action to counter China and to safeguard the interests of the US and other democratic nations. The attacks on Iran, the earlier capture of deposed of Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro and efforts to remove Chinese influence from the Panama Canal all demonstrate that, as tensions with Beijing intensify, Washington has adopted a hardline stance aimed at weakening its power. Iran and Venezuela are important allies and major oil suppliers of China, and the US has effectively decapitated both. The US has continuously strengthened its military presence in the Philippines. Japanese Prime
RSS