Tibetan man jailed in Sweden for spying on Tibetans for China

DHARAMSALA, June 16: A Swedish court has convicted a 49-year-old Tibetan man with espionage for spying on fellow Tibetan refugees in Sweden and Norway for the Chinese government, according to various media reports.

Dorjee Gyantsan had travelled to Poland to meet a Chinese intelligence officer on several occasions and maintained that these meetings had been part of a comprehensive operation to spy on Tibetans living in Sweden, usnews.com cited the court as saying in its report.

“Even if the information that the man gathered can seem trivial, it could have caused considerable damage to Tibetans both in Sweden and abroad,” the judge said in a statement, the report added.

The court sentenced the Tibetan man to one year and ten months in prison for spying on Tibetans for China in Sweden.

The espionage is believed to have taken place from July 2015 till his arrest in February 2017.

Dorjee was arrested in February last year when he had just returned from a trip to Warsaw. He was carrying USD 6,000 in cash, which the prosecutors believe was payment for his information and the Swedish authorities charged him with espionage for spying on fellow Tibetan refugees in Sweden and Norway for the Chinese government earlier in April.

Around 130 Tibetans live in the Scandinavian country and Dorjee is said to have gathered information about exiled Tibetan’s housing, family situation, political activities and meetings.

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