In a grave assault on Tibetan religious heritage, Chinese authorities have demolished over 300 Buddhist stupas and a revered Guru statue in the Drakgo (Ch: Luhuo) County, Karze (Ganzi) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in the traditional Tibet’s province of Kham last month, sources from Tibet report amid heightened restrictions in the region.
The destruction took place in late May or June 2025 at Lungrab Zang-ri (ལུང་རབ་བཟང་རི།) near Janggang Monastery (འཇང་སྒང་དགོན་པ།), where Chinese forces razed hundreds of medium-sized stupas of Tibetan Buddhism and three larger Buddhist stupas. In a brazen act of cultural vandalism, authorities also destroyed a newly constructed statue of Khenpo Jigme Phuntsok, the late founder Abbot of Serthar Buddhist Institute, and a sacred statue of Guru Padmasambhava, generally referred to as Guru Rinpoche (meaning “precious master” in Tibetan). Such acts have left the local Tibetans and community deeply traumatized.
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Following the demolitions, Chinese authorities have imposed an iron curtain of silence over the region. Anyone attempting to share information and even talk about the destruction with the outside world faces immediate detention on charges of “leaking state secrets.” The entire area surrounding the demolition site has been sealed off, and no one is permitted entry or exit.
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This latest assault represents, what Tibetan sources inside Tibet call “second phase of Cultural Revolution”, a deliberate campaign to “Sinicize” Tibetan Buddhism and systematically eradicate
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“The crackdown has intensified following Decree No. 22 issued by the National Religious Affairs Bureau on 1 December 2024, which mandates that all monasteries must operate under strict government control starting 1 January 2025, through the implementation of Article 43 of the Monastery Management Regulations”, said the source.
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[Edit typo.]