Bondi director casts spotlight on Tibet

by Joseph Hull

Local director Mark Gould has documented the brutal shooting of a teenage Tibetan nun by Chinese border police. His film, Tibet: Murder in the Snow, incorporates interviews, re-enactments and original footage of the shooting as witnessed by international climbers hiking in the Himalayas in September 2006.

The group of Tibetan pilgrims were attempting to escape into Nepal through the Nangpa Pass, when they were shot at by Chinese border troops a few hundred metres from the border. The shocking story broke worldwide when American mountain guide Luis Benitez emailed what he had witnessed to a popular climbing website. Romanian climber Segiu Matei also managed to videotape the shooting. The climbers later offered their assistance to survivors.

Gould, a Bondi local since 1984, saw the original footage of the shooting on an episode of the 7:30 report, and immediately began pursuing the story.

“This is the first time in history that a mountain climber has actually filmed or photographed such an event. Anecdotally, this kind of thing has been happening on and off for years. This isn’t the first time this has happened,” said Gould.

“These are Chinese border police shooting unarmed pilgrims in the back as they attempt to cross an 18’000 foot pass. This is sheer, cold-blooded, state-sanctioned murder.”

In August 2007 Gould flew to India to film interviews with survivors, and to gain insight on how the illegal guides who facilitate the crossings operate. Later, in 2008, he, along with cameraman Jeff Malouf, filmed for five weeks in Nepal, India, Slovakia, Romania, Denmark, and the US.

“Some of the interviews lasted three or four hours. We had to take them right back into the deepest, darkest recesses of their memory and have them access some pretty horri?c experiences with the right sort of mindset,” he said.

Initially, official Chinese response was a complete denial of the incident. Later, the shooting was called ‘normal border policing’, along with claims that the guards were retaliating against alleged stone and snowball attacks from the refugees.

“We are talking about an invading people, who in the last 50 years have rounded up Tibetans, locked them inside monasteries and bombed them from the air. They use monasteries and temples as target practice,” said Gould.

“Surely in this day and age, there should be room for more international pressure to improve the situation for people in Tibet.”

The documentary airs on SBS, February 19, at 8:30pm.