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You are now listening to True Murder, The most Shocking Killers in True Crime History and the authors that have written about them Gaesy Bundy Dahmer, The Nightstalker VTK. Every week another fascinating author talking about the most shocking and infamous killers in true crime history. True Murder with your host, journalist and author Dan Zupansky.
Good evening. This is your host Stan Zupaski for the program True Murder, The most shocking Killers in True crime History and the authors that have written about them. Choe Oil Mountain lies nineteen miles east of Mount Everest on the border between Tibetan Nepal. To the elite mountaineering community, it's known as the sixth highest mountain in the world. To Tibetan's Cho Oil represents a gateway to freedom through
the secret glacial path, the Nangpala. On September thirty, two thousand and six, gunfire echoed through the thin air near advanced base camp on Cho Oyu, and climbers preparing the summit watched in horror as Chinese border guards fired at a group of Tibetans fleeing to India via Nepal. Murder in the High Himalaya is the unforgettable account of the brutal killing of Kelsang Namso, a seventeen year old Tibetan un fleeing with the group to Dharmasala to escape religious persecution.
Kelsang's death is a painful example of Tibet's oppression by China, but this time a human rights atrocity was witnessed and documented by dozens of Western climbers. Their moral dilemma was plain, would they tell the world what they had seen. The center of the story as an American climber stuck with a crisis of conscience who gambled with his career to speak out, and a young Tibetan girl who sacrificed her rights who ever returned to the bet by telling the
Western media about the murder of her best friend. Both risked their futures to expose the abuses of China in Tibet and paid a terrible price. The book this Evening featured is Murder in the High Himalaya, Loyalty, Tragedy and Escape from Tibet, with my special guest, journalist and author Jonathan Green, Thank you very much for agreeing to this interview, and welcome to the program. Jonathan Green, Hi, Dan.
Thank you very much for having me.
Well, thank you very much. And first off, I'm going to say a very great read and an incredible book, and I'm sure our audience will enjoy hearing about it this evening. Now, first off, I wanted to ask you why did you decide to write this book? What was it about this story that compelled you to write this book?
Incredibly important story because China is in the ascendant, they're number two economically now behind the United States, and within China there's a very brutal suppression of ethnic minorities. And this particular story is incredibly rare because the murder of Kelsang Namso, the one of the characters in my book, was documented in film by Western climbers, which is a rarity.
Like we know these human rights abuses occur all the time in China, but we never get to hear about them because of the suppression and because China is very I'm effective at making sure that stories like this don't come out and you never hear about them. But in this one instance, circumstances were absolutely bang on that the word that the murder was to witness and films and
you can see the clip on YouTube. But it made this very compelling and I was particularly shocked, like everybody else was, when this unfolded as an international news story in two thousand and six. But I particularly wanted to know who the characters were. Who was this sort of figure falling in the snow at nineteen thousand feet and why were people shooting, and who witnessed this and who were they? And you know, it started me on a very long journey.
Now let's go back a little bit too, really for those people that don't know, and there's probably most people that know as much as that you've unfolded in your book, and would you've given the given the reader through your book is the history of Tibet in China. So if you could give us the why China wanted to dominate Tibet and what that meant in terms of the Tibetans
and the Dali Lama. So if you could briefly explain the importance of the Dali Lama in this entire story to Tibetans and China and explain that to give us a real historical background to the story, which is vital.
Tibet is the highest country in the world. It's at the very top of the globe, but you know parts of it well, it's like the average heights of this is twelve thousand feet, which is as high as the tallest to mountains in Colorado. Before nineteen fifty it was an independent country which bordered China. Mao Zedong decided the Tibet, which is a huge country, it's the size of Western Europe, that it would be beneficial to China to have bath as pass of China. So he invaded with his armies
and took the country by force. At that time, arm Tibet was a theocracy, but most people there have allegiance to the Dalai Lama and Tibetan to Buddhism, and the Dalai Lama tried to deal with mouth for several years. And then in nineteen fifty nine, nine years after the Chinese army invaded, realized that his own life was at great risk, so he made the very dangerous journey over the mountains and went to live in India where he
now lives in exile. And you know, rough three thousand Tibetans a year make this dangerous journey over the mountains to be with him today, Tibet said, you know, it's under Chinese rule. Many Tibetans feel that they, you know, that they're occupied by a foreign power. China insists that Tibet is past of China and parts of their territory, and therein lives the conflict.
Now two, you've talked about the Dali Lama, and but to Tibetans and in Chinese, there's a complete difference on the interpretation and how they speak of the Dali Lama. So to Tibetans, what is really the Dali Lama to them really in personal personified and and how do the Chinese care to rise the same Dali Lama in their propaganda and to other Chinese and to Tibetans went in there. We'll talk a little bit later about this re education process.
Tibetan's believe that the Dalai Lama is a god in human form, that he is here in his current incarnation to help people achieve compassion, to make the world's best place, and to bring peace. But he is outultimately arm a deity om a god. The Chinese governments uh see the Dialai Lama as a very grave threats to their claims over Tibet. Because Tibetan's allegiances to the Dalai Lama and
he now lives in exile. The Chinese governments say that they call him a splicist arm and because a jackal and a wolf in monks robes, and they say that all he wants to do is to split the country up and to split China because the Dalai Lama doesn't believe that Tibet you know, that Tibet should have some sensible autonomy, It should be its own thing. So you know, there's two completely different points of view. And Tibetans are very spiritual and religious, and the Chinese government tries to
ensure that most Chinese people are atheists. They don't. They try to make sure that people don't believe in any type of religion because they see that as a threat to their hold on power. You know, they don't want people to have any other allegiance but to the Chinese Communist Party.
Now, the other thing that the Chinese you say that the reject religion. And but there is about fifteen percent of Tibetan's livers monks and nuns and practice Buddhism and how is their life in Tibet trying to be among practicing monks and nuns. What is their life like in Tibet under those circumstances.
It's very difficult. Indeed, it's very tightly regulated because the government in New York Doris's believe any source of religion is a threat. I mean in you know, modern day China, Chris Tianity is a threat. So there are underground churches in Tibet. They see Buddhism as a threat. So anyone who wants to become a monk or nanor to follow any sources of spiritual path, it's very tightly regulated, and
it's seen as a political act. They Doris's see us as a very grave threat to their hold on power there. So monks and nuns are singled out for particular punishment. And for many years we've hoped, you know, heard of the gravest human rights abuses. People locked up and jailed and tortured and beaten and interrogated. In some cases, you know, they've been killed. It's it's endless, really, it's they see any form of religion as a threat.
Now you begin your book very dramatically with the introduction of one of the main characters and the person that she's in a family. It's also the main characters in your story. But this is an eight year old named Dolma, and her mother Naima, and her brother Rinsen, and then there's a younger brother as well. Introduce our audience to who these people really were. Tell us first about Naima, she's an independent woman. And tell us when this story
takes place. When you begin with the eight year old named Dolma, and tell us about their life, and you can go as far as when the PSB guards and you can explain who those people are and why that story is a strong indication of things to come, and also why you included that in the very dramatic beginning of your book, about the officers coming in and looking for something from this family here. So please explain that for us, please.
They came from a rural path to best It's a place called Dreary County, which is way up in the mountain. It's very high altitude, it's a very tough environment, very inhosvisible. You know, it's minus thirty in the winters. They have a very short kind of summer, and you know, life is extremely tough, but Tibetans have lived like this for, you know, thousands of years. Dolma, who's the main character in my book, she'd lived with her mother and sister
and her brother there. And I start my book with how you know as a young girl, she was eight years years old, that the police came to sort of visit. And if you're a Tibetan, you get very used to the police turning up at any time, day or night, and they're always looking for some type of infraction of the rules. And in modern day Tibet, you can go to prison for five years just for having a photograph
of the Dalai Lama. It's concreted contrabrand and people aren't allowed to have these photographs, and you know, you can go to prison for it. So my book opens with the story with Dolma, who's eight years old, with the police knocking on the door and turning the house upside down looking for pictures of the Dalai Lama. And uh, you know, all Tibetans have an unswerving allegiance to the Dalai Lama, so most people have pictures of him, but
they hide them. So the police come all the time to try to find them.
Now, that's pervading attitude. Is from from I get from your book is that the people defied the Chinese authorities and keep whatever treasured pictures that they have of the Dali Lama in defiance of that. So they so so that they're very resistant to the Chinese rule and and there's not much cooperation with them. Now. You also introduced
Dolma's best friend next door, Dolkar Tomsol. Maybe you can tell us that what Dorma's life was like, but uh, maybe a little bit about her her friend Dolkar Tomso.
Yeah, they were basically her best friends. They that they were. The Doma was, you know, was a year younger, Dolka Tomsy was a year older, and they were very different. Doma was you know, understated and reasoned and balanced, and Dolka, who lived next door, was very impetuous and very passionate, and you know, you saw that the path of her life was to follow to Buddhism. She she you know, felt a particular calling to the religious life.
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Plus, and I think Dolma was not quite so drawn to that, but she supported her friend, and therein uh you know, begins their allegiance to the Dalai Lama, which put them on a direct collision course with the your thorities in China and led to the events that unfold in my book.
Now, how long does it take you introduce Dolma at eight years old? How long does it take for her to grow up in a society that you need to mature very very quickly and take on a lot of responsibilities just to survive. You talk about their their humble existence where burning their fuel is yack dung, and then you even talk about how sometimes the officers would come by and even take a certain portion of that. So
it was a really hard scrabble life. So tell us what her life was like growing up and what did she lean towards. We obviously know that a Dolkar was leaning towards being a nun and and and dedicating her life to Buddhism. Tell us what Dolmar's life was and what her focus was and her interest.
Yeah, I mean, you know, as I said, I mean, it's a particularly tough environment. I mean, because it's such high altitude, there isn't really very much wood, so you know, in order to stay warm you have to have a fuel, so they burn yak dung and yaksa like these big cows that sort of high altitude castle. And it's really that's how Tibetans survive from milk, you know, hide meat. So Dolmra had to grow up very fast. You know.
She took you know, household chores and a lots of responsibility, and sometimes she and Dolker would go up to very you know, go down to lure altitudes to get wood or up sort of neighboring kind of mountains, and you know life was I mean to life was tough. But then Tibetans are very used to living in that way. You know, they don't know anything any kind of difference. I mean, if you went there as your I you know, very used to Western comforts, it would be incredibly tough.
You know.
So it's it's sort of humble in that way. But you know, there's a very strong spirituality and in daily life and family bonds very strong, and I think Doma grew up you know, she loved her mother. They had a very close relationship, and I don't think she thought, you know, she was this sort of average teenager. Really, I mean she I didn't produced her the age of eight, but you see her life flower and you know, but then things started to change, you know, when she was sixteen or seventeen.
Right now, you also include which I thought was very interesting. Maybe you can explain why you included this. You talked about, you know, the hard scrabble existence, but that there was a boom of a boom of sorts by the discovery by athletes that were interested in a fungus that grew at this high altitude. So maybe you can tell us how that story intersects with the complete story itself or why you included that far.
Yeah, I mean, you know, it's a particularly self place. You know, people have to make do with what they have, and in recent years, corter SEPs it's called, which is oddly enough, it's caterpillar fungus, which is seen. It's a big component of Chinese medicine and Eastern medicine, and it's meant to have all these qualities. You know, it's meant to I mean, it's basically meant to do everything that brings you back to life after you die, it can.
It can heal you if you're sick, it can. It's an afro physiac and and it's really work worth a lot of money. They call it soft gold. And where Dolma lived was a particularly rich area in this and
that was how the family really managed to survived. You know, they collected this in the grasslands and then sold it, and that's how they were able to buy things like a motor cycle and out bet the house and said, you know, to be able to go into Lasa, which is the capital of Tibet on pilgrimage and shopping trips and things like that.
Now, and Dolma and Dorcard spoke about door Card being a nun and dedicated her life to Buddhism. There's a catch to this as well, because isn't there a talk of, just like the Dala Lama with fleeing to India, that if you wanted to really practice this religion maybe I'm getting this wrong, that you would inevitably would want to escape. And the center of this story is also this old cho oil and it's a secret path and it's known
for people escaping. So was there talk between the two girls above this and what would mean and tell us about that. I think that was fascinating part of it.
Yeah, I mean it's I mean, people hate to draw this analogy, but I'm going to draw it anyway. It's you know, if you're a Christian and you were offered the choice to meet Jesus Christ, then I'm sure many people would take a very grave risk to be able to do that. Sure as a Buddhist meeting the Dalai Lama is exactly the same thing. It's it's you know,
it's really sort of like a meeting with God. Because the Dalai Lama left the country and he lives in India, and the Chinese don't want anybody going to visit him because they see him as a political threat. I mean, probably much in the same way that the Roman Empire saw Jesus Christ as a threat. They so the really the the the only way to see him is to do so illegally and to undertake an incredibly dangerous journey
over the Himalaya. You know, the high mountains were very little food because you can't announce the or doritors that you're going, and so that really, you know, that was really like the way that so Dolka was sort of going. She felt that, you know, because the Buddhism in Tibet was so tightly regulated that things were so tough. It was they often the two girls discussed, I'm escaping and running over the mountains and getting to see the Dalai Lama.
Okay, now you talk about a climber. Now you fast forward to the other part of the story, you know, almost diametrically opposed, and the other side of the world and some famous mountain climbers, and the whole business of mountain climbing on the sixth highest mountain in the world
a real challenge to people. Explain that whole industry to us, and then you can introduce a couple of the characters like mister Benette Benitez and a couple of other people that end up being central characters in this story as well. Explain that whole industry to our audience.
Yeah, it's the whole mountaineering industry has has expanded to such huge levels in the past thirty or forty years. I mean, it used to be such a rarity to climb mounts have rest. Now there's you know, there's hundreds of people every year who go and you know, it really is, and it's a very expensive sport. I mean, if you want to go and climb Mount Everest, it's going to cost you at least seventy thousands of dollars and you're going to have to take three or four
months off work. So that whole industry even, you know, it's grown and expanded and got huge, and there's a lot of companies operating and the Himalaya now and they offer these trips to people. You know, you can be anyone just as long as you've got the money and you know you have some experience, and I mean or very often they don't answer any experience at all, and they will take you up to the top of these mountains. So these are some of the most remote parts of
the world. And when that happens, you start to interact with people from places life to bed.
Now main character is is Benitez. And I thought was interesting is that you obviously talk about his entire background and to illustrate his motivation for wanting to be this adventurer. And I thought it was interesting how you talk about his early health and how he overcame this, and I think this is part of it. So maybe explain that how he did what he did overcome in his early life and why probably that this life that he had made for himself was even a little more special as
a result. Tell us a little bit about Benitez.
Sure, he's an American from Missouri, I'm originally saying the and he from a very very young age became fascinated with climbing mountains, and I think from his father's some national geographic magazines. And he had very bad childhood asthma and allergies, and everybody said it would be impossible for him to be, you know, anything like a mountain climber, because he simply didn't, you know, have the lung capacity.
But he was a very determined young man and became obsessed with the outdoors and climbing and built up his stamina by climbing in Ecuador, which is where his father is from, and slowly became obsessed with mountain climbing and was a very successful guide and started to work for some of the big companies who work in the Himalaya. And it was his ultimate ambition to climb Mount Everest.
Right now, you talked about him working for a company, You talked about the industry but I was amazed at the groups, how big the groups some of the groups were for this, and the kind of money, and also that he had a pretty strong ego enough to didn't he have an agent.
Yeah, it's all it's all part of the modern you know, the modern sports of mountain climbing. Is it's completely different from what you would expected. I mean, it's it's not these sort of rugged souls laboring away to the top selflessly. It's it's it's all about, you know, getting speaking engagements and book deals and movie deals and marketing yourself and you know, putting yourself out there and you know, it's you know, it's a big show. Really, that's where he was.
This is.
But primarily despite the ego, he loved the attention. He loved to be known for what he was doing, the celebrity of it. But really it seemed like he really overall loved the thrill of climbing more so than anything else.
Yes, like I think he liked both. I mean, he took enormous pride in guiding people up to mountains and that's no sort of mean feet And very early on in his career he did for something extraordinary. He led a blind man all the way to the top of Everest, which would be, you know, an incredibly difficult thing to do because you know, climbing a mountain like that has all sorts of crevasses and dangers and if you can't see you know, that really is for one of the
most crucial requisites in attempting anything like that. So really Benitas was his eyes in that case, and Bensas took an almost pride in taking this guy to the very top.
And it really made a name for him at that time. It was a little earlier on in his career, so that really made a name for himself by by doing that, in achieving that. Yes, yes, Now, how this story intersects obviously is with Choi Oil Mountain and in terms of it's the sixth highest. But why is this mountain? Why is this mountain so preferred by climbers? Why is it such a special mountain for climbers? It's is it? Is it danger? Is it is its a location? What does it?
What does it represent for climbers that makes it so special? Of the altitude, the danger, what is it?
Well, it's the sixth highest mountain in the world. So just in that sort of sense, you know, it's like a sort of trophy for people to claim once they've climbed it. But it's a couple of thousand feet shorter than Mount Everest, but it's twenty eight thousand feet high, which is you know, huge, I mean, it's enormous. You know, the air on top is very thin, it's very hard to breathe. But the crucial difference between this mountain and Mount Severest or other ones is that there are very
few technical aspects of this. And by technical aspects, I mean places where you have to use ropes or you know, ladders and things like that. On Mount Everest, you know, there's a number of parts like that which are treacherous. But the thing with Choi you is that apart from one section of the mountain, you can really walk up the entire thing. But because of that, people underestimates and they underestimate the effects of high altitudes, which are incredibly
tough on the human for the body. So it's really seen as a warm up.
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Mount Severest, which is why a lot of people climb it.
Okay, now we're getting back to Dolmar and Dolcar. I found it interesting too. Maybe you can explain this as well. Is that from your book I got that rins In, Dolma's brother was a monk and didn't remain a monk. Maybe you can tell us why that happened. And and over a certain course of the of a of a year, Dolkar formed a close bond with Kelsang Lebron and he
and he was at the local defunct monastery. So maybe you can explain the course of events that goes on in in Dolcar's life in the last year and her relationship with this Kelsang.
Yeah, to Domar and Doka, but he best friends well, you know, as a grew older Dogcard decided that she absolutely wanted to become a Buddhist nun. So she was going to the local monastery and praying and you know, very heavily involved in the spiritualrual life, which was against her parents sort of wishes. You know, they were worried that their daughter would become become the target of the old doriters and it would make life very hard for her.
And of course, you know, becoming a nun, she you know, she really could get into an awful loss of hot water. And I think, you know, like teenagers like the world over, she was very like rebellious, and you know, she didn't care what her parents thought, and you know, she felt that her allegiance was to the dulied armor and to the spiritual life. So against everybody's to the wishes, she
became a Buddhist nun. And she asked her best friend Omer if she would become become a nun too, And I think Dolma was you know, she was the more sort of reasoned, sensible one, and she probably decided that wasn't quite what she wanted to do. So her friend Dolka went and took her vows and renamed herself Kelsang Nanso, which means lake of jewels. And from that point on she was a Buddhist nun, which began to make life very hard because it's, you know, the whole thing's very
tightly regulated. She came to the attention of the authorities and she became increasingly frustrated that she couldn't practice her faith in the way she wanted. So she decided that she really had no choice but to flee over the mountains and see and to go and see the Dali Lama and perhaps to be able to practice her religion in safety, which would be in northern India.
Now she was planning her escape, and but she needed to speak with She couldn't just do this without anyone's approval. You said her mother didn't approve or her family didn't approve. But maybe you can explain and maybe I'm mispronouncing this. The geishi's approval.
Yeah, the geisha is it's a very high to Buddhist degree. And in order to become a non or a monk, you know, you have to be ordained, you have to take your vows. And Dlka became very close with a geisha in the area who was also called Klsang that's where she she actually took his name and he was the one who, you know, uh, performed the ceremony and that's how she became a nun.
Now, there was some planning on when she would leave, and she left with a group that we're traveling through Darmasala. How often would people attempt to flee, I mean, obviously she was in a group. Told us a little bit more about the organization of when they would leave and who would leave and who was in the group that was trying to flee.
Well, it's it's top secret there. You know, people tried to go all the time, but if they get caught, then they immediately go to prison. So that's the first thing. And it's very likely that you'll get to the beaten and tortured because you're they regardless as a political act that you're you know, running away from China and you're going to see the Dalai Lama who they think is going to tear the country apart. He said, They come
down on it very hard. So it's highly secrets. But in order to navigate this very dangerous journey over the high mountains, they have to find guides, and these guides are highly illegal then they operate, you know, on the very sort of fringes of society, and Dolma and Kelsang had to track down and find a guide who would take them, you know, smuggle them out of the country.
And that's what they set about doing. And Kelsang was trying for a year or so to escape, and her parents knew that this is what she was attempting, and they kept trying to tell her not to to do. It was much too dangerous, but she persisted, and one day, through a friend of a friend, she managed to hear about someone who would take them out, who would get them out of the country. So Dalmar and Kelsang joined the group who were leaving.
And that was I guess in September two thousand and six, Yes, near September thirtieth. So tell us about the actual day, it's very early in the day, or give us a background even the day before what had gone on and things had not gone the way they had thought originally. Pick us back to their journey.
Well, it was all done on the spur at the moment. Because it's highly illegal, no one advertises the fact and you don't get much warning. And Kelsang had found this guide, and you know, she immediately went to her best friend Ohmer and said, look, I can get us out. You know, we can go to India. We can see the Dalai Lama. And I think Dolma so went along with it. She
went along with her friends. So she went home and you know, they managed to scrabble up some money and some clothes, and in I think it was midnight, they you know, two cars came and they went behind the back of the houses at home and got into these cars and there began a very sort of sort of
dangerous journey. They had to go to the capital of Tibet first and then they had to you know, start to travel over the mountains, and of course all the way along there's army checkpoints and military people, and you know there's spies. There are you know, people who dress up as monks and nuns, but they really sort of undercover Chinese Asians. So it's a very dangerous journey.
Did was there something that Naima said to Dorma before she left? What did her mother say to Dorma.
I think she said, just be you know, very careful and you know, take care of yourself. It's but you know, none of them. You know, Dorma's mother didn't want her to go. You know, nobody did.
Right, but still it was a pretty strong response, or I mean, very encouraging despite not wanting her daughter to go.
Of course, I mean they understand. I mean, I think it would be like here in the States if you said you were going to upsticks and going go and see God. I mean, I think people, you know, on a journey that may kill you well ultimately, I mean I think people would be against you going, but they'd understand why you did it.
Yes, it just seems like a very seriously religious place where your convictions are very strong. That's all I could I could say with the mother realizing what's going on and despite that saying I know my daughter is going to leave, and I understand basically whether I don't.
Yes, I mean, you know, I think as we said, I mean, you know, Tibet's a particularly harsh place. It's a very tough place to live. And I think what sustains people is, you know, a very strong belief and a very strong spirit tuality. So even though you sort of grow up in this very tough environments, you have a very strong spirit and Tibetans are like no others in you know, that this overpowering spirituality that you know, they're willing to do everything for.
You know.
Right now, let's get to the events on September thirty is, two thousand and six, to the tragic events. Maybe you can take us through that day from the beginning and what transpired in total.
Yeah, Domar and Kelsang had joined this group. They'd managed to get to Lassa un detected, and then they were smuggled out of the city in the back of the truck. And there's only a certain way they can go in this truck before. You know, they can't just drive into India because they'll be caught. There's checkpoints. So the only way is to take this very high pass called banang Pala which goes up to nineteen thousand feet and it's all ice and snow and rocks and very very tough place.
And the truck stops before that. But they had another, you know, at least ten days of walking to get over this high path and then down again into Nepal and then to get on into India. So they started working, started walking ten days earlier, and they had very little food and water or anything to sustain them because of course they couldn't have big backpacks with supplies because the old plorises would know what they were doing. So they
really left with very little. And they started out on this trip and there were seventy five of them smuggling in the back of this truck with Domra and Kelsang, and people started to run out of food and ran out of water, and people just sort of slumped on the trail through exhaustion. And there were many children in the group as well, because many parents in Tibet send their you know kids to go and see the Dalai Lama and have an education in India, which are things
that they can't have in Tibet. So it was incredibly arduous journey. And just when they got to the Nangpowa Pass, which is this you know, high altitude on the border between Tibetan Nepal, they intersected with Luis Benitez and these mounting climbers who were climbing Choiu, which overlooks this high pass. So these two groups converged over several weeks. They didn't know each other, you know, they came from completely different
walks of life. You have, you know, starving Tibetan refugees with Dormer and cal Sang amongst them, and then coming the other way, you have very very rich Western climbers who come from you know, money and have decided that
they want to climb this sort of mountain. So the two groups converged, But at the same time, there was a third group converging, which were Chinese border troops who somehow heard that refugees were escaping, and their orders are to shoot to kill anybody who's trying to unescape from Tibet. And that's really where, you know, the three narrative threads of my story converged. And then that's when the guns started to go off.
Now you said that there was people documenting this, and we'll get to that as well. But what happens that actual day the border guards start firing on these people. Why are climbers shocked? Why is Louis Bonitaz shocked? Why are these climbers shocked? If this is something that people can expect, if they have orders to shoot to kill, maybe you could tell our audience why this is so unusual? Then? Why is everybody in shock? Is there something unusual about this particular day?
Yeah?
I mean you know, you climb to mountains in Pimolaire or Colorado or Alaska, and you know, the last thing you expect to see on these trips is soldiers, you know, firing on women and children and to refugees. So the climbers are up in camp and they're you know, waiting to do the next stage of their climb. And you know, modern climbers have all sorts of the meannesses. You know, they take you know, wine and who's up there, and
they have you know, very good food. So you know, even though it's a pretty tough environment, they still have a sort of creature comforts of home. You know, they watch for DVDs and I think the previous night they've been kind of watching the Matrix, you know, in their tents, so you know, there's still a lot of sort of semblance of what happens back here in the States or
anywhere else. And they wake up in the morning, you know, early in the morning, and they hear pops and they think it's somebody sort of letting off fire crackers because you know, it's at high altitude. What else could it be.
Then quickly they see Chinese soldiers running into camp and guns out and blazing away, and they realize that obviously something's happening, and they see this sort of snaking row of ants, well what they think to look like ants, these these small black sort of figures, which you cause the refugees and Dormer and Kalsang are I'm amongst them, and the soldiers far away, and so when the bullets start to fly, you know, some people to get his.
Now explain who how if I mispronounced this get if you could correct me, uh, Mattie and Pavlov Koljik Pavlov taking photographs and serge Mate video graphing or or videotaping some of this or the event itself. How did they become they were part of the climb with Benitez or explain how they became, how they came to be there and also were involved in documenting the murder and these soldiers shooting on these innocent people.
Yeah, I mean there were I think around twenty to thirty X editions on Choiu at that time, so there were you know, at least one hundred climbers in advanced sort of base camp, which is where all this took place. Sergei Mattia was a Roumanian. He was actually a professional cameraman, but he was there on holiday, on vacation and wanted to climb this mountain. Then the whole thing that morning erupted.
Soldiers started to come, they started to open fire, and you know, it was his first instinct to grab his camera, his video camera and to start filming it. And he knew very well that these were refugees. That who the soldiers were firing on was, you know, like it's there wasn't other soldiers, it was, it was refugees, which is, you know, so against the UN convention and all manner
of other things. So he started to film. You have to understand that the atmosphere in China in modern day t best is very very oppressive, and China doesn't want this type of thing coming out. So the soldiers don't you know, they don't want people taking photographs, they don't want people filming this. And really, you know, you take your life in your hands, and it really is like
the world West. And I think Sergi really put his life at Lesk, but was determined to film what was happening, which is what he did, and he captured this as the groups, as the group of refugees tried to escape, and yeah, I think there were probably twenty to thirty soldiers and they were, you know, blazing away with Ak forty sevens. And in the distance a small sort of figure fell down on the snow and collapsed in a heap and was high kept filming.
And this figure that fell in the snow was the subject of our story, kel Sang.
So yes, it was Kelsang who was shot in the back and killed almost instantly. I mean it was a murder, it was, it was. It was a murder of a refugee, and Sergium as high really to Rissy's life to film it and to have evidence of of this, which you know, which has never been done. I mean it's it's you know, China is always saying everything is fine there and it's okay, but Matthai had this evidence.
Now, how does Louise Benitez become a more heroic figure in this? He he is worried about his business. He has this pretty big ego here he as an agent. But despite you know, his moral dilemma of you know, risking his career and we've alluded to that. Tell us what Louise Benitez does and says, and how his actions really affect this entire story.
He looked on at all this, you know, shocked as much as everybody. I mean, he'd been on numerous climbing expeditions. He'd never seen anything like this. It was just, you know, he just didn't know what to make him. But he's just sort of slacked jored. His best reaction, I think was to get himself and his clients out of camp, for his own, for the safety, and for everybody else. And they carried on with the planners normal, and the
plan was to climb up the mountain. They're about halfway up, so they packed all their stuff and started climbing up the mountain. And as they left camp and head up, they walked past this small black figure in the snow who was Kelsang namso that you know, they learned that much kind of later. But they carried on as climbers do, and walked past the body. And you know, we're very intense on reaching the summit, which is their goal. And Ben, he says, kept going and but this time he had
a crisis of conscience. He began to realize that it will He knew that they were refugees and that he just witnessed a murder, but he didn't quite know what to do about it. So he kept climbing up the mountain and kept sort of going, and by the time he got to the next camp, I think he was very angry at sort of what he had seen, that these Chinese soldiers had opened fire on children and sort of refugees. So he decided that perhaps he was going
to do something about it, so he broke camp. He let his clients carry up on their own, and he got back down to base camp, which is a couple of days after all this happened by this time, and sat down with his laptop and light connection and emailed out to a climbing website called x web about how he'd just seen Chinese soldiers murder a refugee. And that's how the story got out on the mountain, and that's
how people started to hear about it. It started to, uh, you know, like reporters around the world started to get on the story. It came on all the networks, you know, and it was, you know, really the fact that China was was was kind of doing this, you know, so he you know, but I think at the time, I'm not sure if he knew it or not, but certainly, you know, because China doesn't want people talking about this stuff. They banned people who speak about their human rights abuses.
So by Luis doing this, he puts his own career at great risk because he had to be able to climb in the mountains for his livelihood.
Right. The other part is the Sergei Matai is a guy thinking that maybe the Chinese will will retaliate for him shooting this footage. So it's interesting how paranoid he is and how he thinks that they can. They have a long arm to reach out to him. How does he get the footage out of the country, and where does he go and how does the world react when the story is broken through this footage and who is the first country to really step forward and do something.
Well, he's of course absolutely paranoid that the soldiers have seen his film this, that there is actually evidence of this, which is like you know, to any other murder. And you know, people carrying out murders don't want sort of witnesses, and they particularly don't want somebody filming it. And the people who've carried it out, and you know, sergiay was was, you know, terrified that they knew what he had filmed. And you know, the atmosphere up in the climber's camp
I think was very intimida thing. There were soldiers trying to find Tibetans and you know, really rounding everybody up. I mean, they caught forty sort of refugees and carted them all off to a prison and tortured them. And Sergiay had this tape and he kept it with him at all times and hid it in a pouch which he had like around his kind of waist, and then he and his climbing partners left and smuggled it out of the country and managed to get back home to Romania,
where they were from. And immediately the Romanian television stations got hold of the tape and started to broadcast it. And this was really when the story took off the massive effect. I mean, Benie says. The American Climb had sort of emailed out about it, but with no pictures or footage, so you know, people, you know, people often don't trust these reports. You know, you have to have
evidence of it. And Matai put out this tape which was broadcast and got bought by CNN and the BBC and started to be shown in the States and Europe. And this is when the whole story just kicked off. And I should add that because the day before, you know, the Chinese had been asked about this murder in the mountains from beneath Teza's email, and they'd said, no, you know,
this is not being you know, so nothing's happened. There was a standard border in incident, but you know, and they were very vague about it and said sort of nothing had happened. But Matthias sort of footage changed all that. It changed everything. And here was irrare fusible evidence of a murder and the world could see that.
And the world did react.
Yes, I mean people, you know, people were absolutely shocked and appalled. And you know, his China about the host the Olympic game, you know, in two thousand and eight, a couple of years hence, and they're telling everyone that
life in China's grace and everybody's really happy. And here, up on screens all over the world, the Chinese to the soldiers opening fire on children and people escaping, and quite clearly you can see a small black sort of figure falling in the Snow, which we discovered was Kelsang Snanso, a seventeen year old from Biu who wanted to get to India because she wanted to be able to practice her faith and to see Bedalai Lama.
So her best friend Dorma makes it the freedom and tells the story. Tell us a little bit about.
That, yeah to Dolma made it through and she got to India and again, you know, a key part of this book is that China tries to ensure nobody says anything about what happens there, that there's this conspiracy of silence that everybody's party to. And Dolma realized that by speaking out about this, she'd never be able to go home. She could never go back to China again. Well, she'd never go back to Tibet, so she could never go back to her family or to see her mother again.
You know, she would be forever an outcast. And she decided, because of the memory to her friend and the fact that people don't hear the truth of what's happening in Tibet, to stand up and to tell tell the story, no mass of the cost, no matter of what it cost. She was going to say, fanned off and to tell what happened to her friend and how she was madgive So she proceeded to do that, and she gave interviews
on television and radio. And you have to remember too that you know, she was really just a young girl. She was sixteen and had no experience of the West or like the outside world. So to stand up with that type of courage at that age, you know, against some military superpower, is extraordinary.
Yes, it is absolutely, yes, an incredible story. And the story doesn't end there because Tibetans are emboldened and protests and so the story does not end anywhere near this. So there's much more to the story. Unfortunately, we've used up our hour and people will have to go out and purchase that book and read the rest the fascinating story. There is quite a bit left to the story. And I want to thank you very much Jonathan for coming on the program and talking about your book, Murdering the
High Himalaya. It's been very enjoyable and very informative, and it's a great book.
Like I say, thank you, Dan to my pleasure to enjoyed it too.
Now, I wanted to tell people that it's Murdering the High Himalaya and Jonathan Green is the author. I guess you can get this book anywhere. Barnes and Noble everywhere their favorite bookstore obviously.
Yeah, Amazon too, I think you know, it's it's cheapest. I think Amazon and Noble at the moment.
Yeah, yeah, absolutely, Yeah, they do a great job, you know for sure. Well, I want to thank you very much again for coming on the program and talking about your great book Murdering the High Himalaya, Loyalty, Tragedy and Escape from Tibet. And I want to thank you very much for coming on and have yourself a great evening, Jonathan, Thank you, my pleasure, Thank you very much.
Good night.
You've been listening to the program True Murder, the most shocking killers in true crime history and the authors that have written about them, with your host Dan Zapaski with my special guest, Jonathan Green, a Murder in the High Himalaya. Good evening,