Choegyal Wangpo (曲嘉旺波) is a Tibetan Buddhist monk from Tengdro Monastery in Tingri County, Tibet Autonomous Region.
According to Human Rights Watch, police detained him in late August or early September 2019 after searching a cellphone he had mistakenly left in a Lhasa café. The phone contained messages with Tibetans living in Nepal, including records of a donation from Tengdro Monastery to support recovery after the 2015 Nepal earthquake.
Human Rights Watch reported that Choegyal Wangpo was beaten and interrogated. Security forces later raided his home village and Tengdro Monastery and detained numerous monks and villagers. Choegyal Wangpo and three other monks—Lobsang Jinpa, Norbu Dondrub, and Ngawang Yeshe—remained detained.
In September 2020, the Shigatse Intermediate People’s Court tried the four monks in secret. The charges were not disclosed. Choegyal Wangpo received a 20-year prison sentence; the other three received 19, 17, and 5 years respectively.
Chinese Human Rights Defenders reports that his place of incarceration and current whereabouts are unknown. Rights Defense Network Issue 131, dated August 31, 2026, lists 曲嘉旺波 among people reported as serving 20-year sentences.
Evidence limits
No PRC court judgment or official case record was located. Human Rights Watch and the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy document that the verdicts are absent from China’s national court-verdict database. No specific charge, current prison location, or release date is stated here.
Media Profile & Archive: Choegyal Wangpo / 曲嘉旺波 — Media Profile & Archive.