Students for a Free Tibet announced today that the Pabst Blue Ribbon billboard celebrating the "50th Anniversary of the Peaceful Liberation of Tibet" had been removed from Lhasa, the capital city of Tibet. Photographs of Chinese workers dismantling the billboard confirmed the removal. Pabst Brewing Company asked their Chinese licensee to remove the billboard after the student group informed them of the situation in late October.

Pabst Brewing Company, the fourth largest brewer in America, received over 1,500 faxes about the billboard in less than a week. Pabst's CEO Brian Kovalchuk was quoted in the San Antonio News-Express last week as saying "I'm staring at folders full of printouts of the emails right now, and the stack is at least 6 to 8 inches thick. We're taking this very seriously."

Students for a Free Tibet expressed satisfaction at the way Pabst dealt with their concerns. "Pabst responded quickly to our concerns, began working to get the billboard taken down immediately, issued a public statement addressing the issue, and took steps to ensure that nothing like this would ever happen again," said John Hocevar, Executive Director of Students for a Free Tibet. "Executives at BP and Morgan Stanley should learn from their example. While it may take longer for us to get through to bankers and oil barons, we can build on our success here and make sure all corporations understand that it is never going to be profitable to take advantage of China's occupation of Tibet."

China’s 1949 invasion and ensuing occupation of Tibet has lead to over 1.2 million Tibetan deaths, the destruction of more than 6,000 monasteries, and has pushed the Tibetan people and their culture to the brink of extinction. According to the latest U.S State Department report on religious freedom, "repression of religious freedom in Tibet reached severe levels" in 2000. The report went on to say "many persons, including monks and nuns, were arrested for attempting to protest peacefully or for refusing to abide by rules imposed by government authorities in Buddhist monasteries. There were reports of the death of religious prisoners, as well as the imprisonment and abuse or torture of monks and nuns accused of political activism."

"Tibetans - both inside Tibet and in exile - are extremely encouraged to see this billboard come down," said Lhadon Tethong, SFT Projects Coordinator. "It is sometimes hard to be hopeful when our people have been brutalized and oppressed for so long. After 50 years under Chinese rule, Tibetans are finding new ways to fight back - and we are winning!"

1. 2.
3. 4.