Zhaxi Jie / 扎西杰
Zhaxi Jie (Chinese: 扎西杰) is a Tibetan from Zoige (Ruoergai) county in the Aba Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture of Sichuan province. In December 2015 he filmed a fellow villager’s street protest and circulated the footage online, and was detained by police within days. In 2016 he was formally arrested and sentenced by the prefecture authorities. The charge against him, the length of his sentence, and the prison where he is held have not been publicly documented.
Background
According to the case record, residents of Zhaxi Jie’s township had long been affected by the seizure of their land by the government, by forced relocation without resettlement, and by unanswered grievances. Villagers carried out repeated peaceful petitions, but none brought results.
Filming the protest and detention
In December 2015, Zhaxi Jie filmed a fellow Zoige county resident, Zhaxi Dunzhu (扎西顿珠), as Dunzhu carried out a solo protest on the streets of the county town — draped in a Buddhist prayer flag and holding aloft a large portrait of the Dalai Lama — and circulated the footage online. Around December 19, 2015, local police detained Zhaxi Jie and placed him under criminal detention. The charge against him is not publicly known.
Arrest and sentencing
In 2016, Zhaxi Jie was formally arrested together with Zhaxi Dunzhu by the Aba prefecture authorities and sentenced to a fixed-term prison sentence. The specific charges, the lengths of the sentences, and the prisons where they are held have not been publicly documented.
Current status
His present status is unknown. The only public records — a human-rights case database entry and a 2026 prisoner roster — document the 2016 sentencing but provide no release information and no current whereabouts. No source has reported his release, but no source has confirmed he remains in custody.
See the Media Profile & Archive for the documented source record of this case.