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Showing posts with label conflict in Tibet. Show all posts
Showing posts with label conflict in Tibet. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Reuters - China seeks to contain ongoing Tibet unrest
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China seeks to contain ongoing Tibet unrest
Wednesday, Mar 26, 2008 1:41PM UTC
By Benjamin Kang Lim and Lindsay Beck
BEIJING (Reuters) - China sought on Wednesday to contain ongoing protests in its ethnic Tibetan regions, as it stepped up detentions in Tibet's capital Lhasa and vowed tighter control over monasteries.
The western province of Qinghai was the latest area to report anti-government activities, with hundreds of civilians staging a sit-down protest after paramilitary police stopped them from marching, a Beijing-based source who spoke to residents said.
"They were beating up monks, which will only infuriate ordinary people," the source said of the protest on Tuesday in Qinghai's Xinghai county.
A resident in the area confirmed the demonstration, saying that paramilitaries dispersed the 200 to 300 protesters after half and hour, that the area was crawling with armed security forces and that workers were kept inside their offices.
The Tibet unrest -- and China's response to it -- has also become a lightning rod for criticism of its Communist authorities ahead of the Beijing Olympics, marring the country's desire to use the Games as a "coming out" party.
The unrest began with a series of peaceful marches in Lhasa earlier this month that soon led to a deadly riot. China says 19 people died in the violence, while representatives of the Tibetan government-in-exile say 140 died in clashes.
China has pinned the blame for the protests on the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism who lives in exile in India. He fled Tibet in 1959 after a failed uprising against Chinese rule, and denies he masterminded the demonstrations.
But echoing China's public security minister, Chinese scholars vowed to press ahead with "patriotic education" in Tibet's monasteries, accusing monks there of being duped by the Dalai Lama into supporting separatism.
The education campaigns, which have increased under Tibet's current Communist Party boss, Zhang Qingli, are blamed by some for sowing resentment of Beijing within the region's Buddhist monasteries, but the scholars said they were necessary.
"The purpose of patriotic education is because the Dalai clique has been trying hard to disrupt development in Tibet and disrupt the normal practices of Tibetan Buddhism," Dramdul, who heads the Religious Studies Institute at the China Tibetology Research Centre, told a news conference.
"Patriotic education ought to stop the infiltration attempts by the Dalai clique and provide education to the monks," he said.
CRACKDOWN
The Beijing source said resentment at the paramilitary presence around Lhasa's monasteries prompted one monk at the Ramoche temple to hang himself.
Police were searching for those involved in the demonstrations and the riot earlier this month.
"It's very harsh. They are taking in and questioning anyone who saw the protests," the source said. "The prisons are full. Detainees are being held at prisons in counties outside Lhasa."
Despite international calls for Beijing to use restraint in its response to the unrest, the United States and Britain have reiterated their support for the Beijing Games, although Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton said Washington should be more forceful in speaking out against violence in Tibet.
"I don't think we should wait until the Olympics to make sure that our views our known," Clinton told reporters.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Tuesday refused to rule out a possible boycott of the Olympics.
Beijing on Wednesday criticized French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner for saying he could not tolerate the crackdown in Tibet and French Junior Minister for Human Rights, Rama Yade, for saying she would meet the Dalai Lama if he visited France.
"The Lhasa riot is a violent, secessionist incident planned and incited by the Dalai group," the official Xinhua news wire quoted Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang as saying.
"Any country that has an objective and just point of view should understand and support China's measures to maintain social stability and safeguard people's lives and property."
RESENTMENT
In a letter circulated by the Washington-based International Campaign for Tibet, a Lhasa resident described tight controls on religion and resentment over an influx of Han Chinese residents since a rail link was built to the remote, mountain region.
"While the government promised that the new railway to Lhasa would bring prosperity, tourism and cheaper goods to the region, the reality is that it has brought so many new settlers that the demand for, and consequently the price of, everyday commodities has sharply risen," the letter said.
"Monks are always discriminated (against) and targeted as the primary danger to the state," it added.
But, illustrating the gulf in views about the cause of unrest between Beijing and Lhasa, Lhagpa Phuntshogs, who directs the China Tibetology Research Centre, said the Dalai Lama had instigated marches among monks, who wanted to restore serfdom.
"What do they want? I think it's very clear that they want to try to restore the old theocracy in Tibet. The separatist elements are not happy with the end of theocracy in Tibet ... and they are not happy with the end of backwardness in Tibet."
(Additional reporting by John Ruwitch; Editing by David Fogarty)
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
1000 Arrested in Tibet
From
March 18, 2008
1,000 Tibetans arrested in Chinese crackdown
(AP)
Rioters in Lhasa: many have been rounded up by the Chinese authorities
Close to 1,000 Tibetans have been detained in two days of sweeps across the capital, Lhasa, by paramilitary police hunting down those who took part in last week’s deadly anti-Chinese riots.
Sources in the city said around 600 people had been detained on Saturday and another 300 had been picked up on Sunday. They said it was not clear where those rounded up were being detained because the main Drapchi prison in Lhasa is already believed to be virtually full.
Those detained could be taken to the old Number One prison in the Sangyip district in the northeast of Lhasa that is currently not believed to be in use.
They may be held in the nearby Number Four detention centre and the New Lhasa prison in the same district that has recently been used as a re-education-through-labour centre. They could even be taken to the new Chushur prison some distance outside Lhasa where most political prisoners are believed to be jailed after sentencing.
Chinese officials were not available to confirm the total number of arrests.
With the expiry on midnight yesterday of a deadline for the Tibetan protesters who on Friday stabbed and hacked ethnic Han Chinese, hurled rocks and set fire to offices, shops and schools, the search for those involved has gathered momentum.
In the Karma Lunsang district, a warren of old Tibetan homes in the east of the city that the authorities suspect has served as an important hideout for the protesters, police and paramilitary were going house to house to check identity papers. One witness said: “Many people have been taken away, but we don’t know how many.”
The sources said it was not known how many people might have surrendered in return for promises of leniency before the midnight deadline or how many had been arrested since Monday.
Police and troops were manning checkpoints across the city, checking all identity papers and it was still quite difficult for people to move easily through the streets.
Foreign journalists travelling in areas near Tibet have reported seeing movements of troops in the direction of the Himalayan region. Sources said garrisons of the People’s Liberation Army around Lhasa have been placed on a grade one alert in case of more trouble.
Chinese authorities have blamed Tibetan mobs manipulated by the exiled Dalai Lama for the deaths of 13 people in the riots on Friday. Tibetan exile groups have said as many as 100 people may have been killed as troops backed by armoured personnel carriers moved in to the city to quash the biggest protests against Chinese rule in 19 years.
Wen Jiabao, the Chinese Premier, in his first remarks on the unrest, accused the rioters of trying to disrupt the Olympic Games that start in Beijing on August 8. “They wanted to incite the sabotage of the Olympic Games in order to achieve their unspeakable goal."
Although L0hasa was quiet, the unrest had spread to nearby provinces with large Tibetan populations. In northwestern Gansu, which borders Tibet, large numbers of ethnic Tibetans took to the streets late on Sunday, burning shops and business belonging to ethnic Han Chinese and Hui Muslims and burning 16 cars, said one witness.
From Monday night, all government offices had been ordered to remain on duty around the clock. A local government order said: “Without a notice, no one may leave their posts.”
In neighbouring Sichuan province, an ethnic Tibetan told Reuters he knew of no fresh outbreaks of unrest since Monday. “Now they are bringing back stability. There are so many police and People's Armed Police it will be difficult for anything to spread. I'm sure the People's Liberation Army is waiting too. In the background waiting, if the situation really gets out of hand."
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Hard Lines Drawn on conflict in Tibet
Dalai Lama Chinese Premier Wen Jaibao
Hard lines are drawn in the sand on the conflict in Tibet. Click here for AP video report.
Sunday, March 16, 2008
Conflict in Tibet sees no end
The New York Times
March 16, 2008
Dalai Lama Won’t Stop Tibet Protests
By SOMINI SENGUPTA and HARI KUMAR
MCLEODGANJ, India — The Dalai Lama said Sunday that he would not instruct his followers inside Tibet to surrender before Chinese authorities, and he described feeling “helpless” in preventing what he feared could be an imminent blood bath.
“I do feel helpless,” he said in response to a question at a wide-ranging, emotionally charged news conference here in what has served as the headquarters of the Tibetan government in exile for nearly 40 years. “I feel very sad, very serious, very anxious. Cannot do anything,”
His aides said they had received reports from Tibet of 80 killings on Thursday and Friday alone, in and around the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, including 26 slain just outside a prison called Drapchi. Chinese state media has reported 10 deaths and characterized most of them as shopkeepers ”burned to death” during protests.
Tibetan exiles here said they had also received news of at least two Buddhist monks who set themselves on fire as an act of protest; that claim could not be independently confirmed.
For the second straight day on Sunday, protests spread into different Tibetan regions of China. Buddhist monks and police reportedly clashed in a Tibetan region of Sichuan Province. A crowd of 200 Tibetan protesters burned down a local police station, news agencies reported.
One witness said a police officer was killed in the confrontation. But the India-based Tibet Center for Human Rights and Democracy reported that the police in the region had killed at least seven Tibetan protesters.
The Dalai Lama, who heads the government in exile and serves as the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism, called Sunday for an independent international inquiry into the recent violence.
He endorsed the right to peaceful protest, called violence an “act of suicide,” and accused Beijing of carrying out “a rule of terror.”
Asked if he could stop Tibetan protesters from flouting Beijing’s deadline to surrender by midnight on Monday, the Dalai Lama, 72, replied swiftly: “I have no such power.”
He said he had received a call on Saturday from Tibet. “‘Please don’t ask us to stop,’” was the caller’s request. The Dalai Lama promised he would not, even though he said he expected the Chinese authorities to put down the protests with force.
“Now we really need miracle power,” he said, and then laughed. “But miracle seems unrealistic.”
As he entertained questions for over an hour here inside a temple in the lap of snow-capped Himalayas, the limits of his influence, and even his “middle path” message of freedom for Tibetans, rather than total independence for Tibet, came into sharp relief, as thousands of mostly young Tibetan exiles raised a chorus of stridently anti-Chinese slogans and called for secession.
“We the young people feel independence is our birthright,” said Dolma Choephel, 34, a social worker active with the Tibetan Youth Congress and who gathered Sunday morning at a demonstration outside the gates of the main town temple. “We understand the limitations of the Dalai Lama’s approach. What we got after six rounds of talks — this violence?” She was referring to the six negotiating sessions between the Dalai Lama and Chinese authorities since 2002.
Just behind where Ms. Choephel stood, Buddhist monks began a hunger strike. Protesters laid down Chinese flags on the road, inviting cars and pedestrians to trample on them. Later, thousands streamed down the hill, to Dharamsala town, the largest Tibetan settlement in India. Many of them had painted their faces with the colors of the Tibetan flag. “Long live the Dalai Lama,” they chanted, which made it plain that despite their far more radical calls, they remained loyal to his spiritual leadership.
Late Sunday evening, candles were lit on window sills and balconies across these hills. Tibetan-owned shops were closed in solidarity with the demonstrations across the border.
The Indian authorities, meanwhile, found themselves in an uncomfortable diplomatic spot. The Indian police earlier last week had arrested a group of demonstrators who vowed to walk roughly 900 miles from here to Lhasa, but allowed a second group to set off Saturday morning unimpeded.
India has hosted Tibetan refugees since the Dalai Lama’s exodus in 1959, but on condition that they not protest against Chinese government on Indian soil. New Delhi’s efforts to warm up to Beijing in recent years has made the Tibet issue an exceptionally tricky matter. The Dalai Lama, while acknowledging Indian hospitality to Tibetan refugees — there are an estimated 130,000 Tibetans in India — described the official government position on Tibet as “overcautious.”
A young Tibetan monk was less circumspect about government restrictions on the proposed march from India to Tibet. After all, said Tenzin Damchoe, the Indian-born child of Tibetan refugees, Tibetans had learned the art of the peaceful protest march from Gandhi. “It’s a little bit disgrace,” Mr. Damchoe, 30, said.
As for the revolt inside Tibet, he said he could only imagine the worst. “They crushed their own people,” he said of the Chinese response to the Tianemen Square pro-democracy protests in 1989. “There’s no doubt they will crush the Tibetan people.”
The Dalai Lama, for his part, seemed unfazed about the dissent among Tibetans over full independence versus greater autonomy. Even his elder brother, he recalled, had admonished him many years ago for not advocating independence from China. “ ‘My dear younger brother, the Dalai Lama,’ ” his brother told him. “ ‘You sold out the Tibetan legitimate right. Like that.’ ”
The Dalai Lama described dissent as “a healthy sign of our commitment to democracy, open society.”
Chuckling, he added that the idea might come as “a surprise to our Chinese brothers and sisters.”
He described himself as a Marxist Buddhist, quoted Mao Tse Tung’s endorsement of dissent in the party, and blamed local Communist Party officials inside Tibet, rather than the party leadership in Beijing, for what he called the rise of government repression against Tibetan Buddhists in the last couple of years.
He accused Chinese officials of resorting only to force when confronted with a crisis. “They have no experience how to deal with problems through talk, only suppress,” he said.
Asked several times whether he endorsed the protests, which had at times had turned violent over the last week, the Dalai Lama said Tibetans were entitled to air their grievances peacefully. “Protest, peaceful way, express their deep resentment is a right,” he said.
He said he was aware that the Chinese government blamed him for fomenting rebellion. “I’m happy they found some scapegoat,” he said, in half-jest, and then described what he said were deep-rooted grievances.
“Whether the Chinese government admits it or not, there is a problem. The problem is a nation with ancient cultural heritage is actually facing serious dangers,” he said. “Whether intentionally or unintentionally, some kind of cultural genocide is taking place.”
He maintained that he was not calling for secession from China “in terms of material development is concerned.” “We get much benefits,” from being a part of China, as he put it and said he could endorse only nonviolent protest. He said he remained supportive of China’s hosting of the Olympic Games, but called on the international community to exercise its “moral responsibility” to remind Beijing about human rights.
Jim Yardley contributed reporting from Beijing.
Copyright 2008 The New York Times Company
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