Tibet Crisis: May 2008 Archives

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May 24, 2008

Tibetans offer Solace to China Quake Victims through Prayers

Monday, 19 May 2008, 2:46 p.m.

The Department of Religion and Culture of the Central Tibetan Administration organised a special prayer session for the victims of the powerful earthquake that rocked southwestern parts of China, at the main Buddhist temple in Dharamshala, India, on 14 May 2008/File Photo
Dharamshala: Thousands of Tibetan people congregated at the Tsuglagkhang (main temple) here Monday to offer their deep sympathy and prayers to the families of those thousands of people killed and injured in the two recent natural calamities - cyclone Nargis in Myanmar and the earthquake that struck southwestern parts of China.

Similar prayer sessions are also held simultaneously in all the Tibetan settlements across India, Nepal and Bhutan under the aegis of local Tibetan solidarity committees.

According to official Xinhua news agency, the 7.9 magnitude earthquake that jolted Wenchuan County of Sichuan Province in southwest China on 12 May, has caused deaths over 22,000 and 4.8 million people have lost their homes.

In his address, Karma Chophel, speaker of the Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile in his address said: "The Central Tibetan Administration and all the Tibetan people in exile convey their heartfelt condolences to the families of the victims of the devastating earthquake and stands in solidarity with the Chinese people in this hour of grief and sadness."

As a mark of respect, the speaker appealed to all Tibetans to put off protests in front of Chinese embassies until the end of May.

Speaker Karma Chophel addressing a press conference after a special congregation organised at the main Buddhists temple in Dharamshala, India, on 19 May 2008/Photo: Bangchen
He said: "We welcome Premier Wen Jiabao's visit to the affected areas to bring solace and take stock of the situation in a time of such disaster."

The speaker, however, condemned the Chinese government's double standard attitude towards handling of crisis in China and that of Tibet. He said the earthquake in China drew immediate attention of the highest echelons of the communist party, with both the Premier Wen Jiaboa and President Hu Jintao visiting the affected areas and mobilising troops to expedite saving human lives. On the contrary, in Tibet, hundreds of Tibetans have lost their lives and injured and thousands have been as a result of the Chinese military crackdown on peaceful protesters.

He expressed concern that Tibetans might have affected by the earthquake, since the largely hit areas by the powerful quake also include Tibetan inhabited Lungu county (Ch: Wen Chuang), Tashi Ling county (Ch; Lixian), Sungchu county (Ch:Song Pan), Trochu county (Ch: Xiao Jing) and Maowen county (Ch: Mao Wen) under Ngaba (Ch: Aba) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture (TAP) in Sichuan Province.

"In this hour of tragedy, we hope and appeal to the Central Government of the People's Republic of China to deliver timely rescue and relief to all the affected areas, without any distinction of people and place," he added.

He also urged the Chinese government to halt all repressive measures in Tibet and to respect Tibetan people's sentiment by adopting a realistic approach of reviewing its policies in Tibet.

In the immediate aftermath of the earthquake hit China, His Holiness the Dalai Lama and the Central Tibetan Administration extended deep sympathy, heartfelt condolences and prayers to those affected families.

On 14 May, a special prayer congregation was organised by the Department of Religion and Culture at the main temple here, led by monks of the Namgyal Monastery.

http://www.tibet.net/en/flash/2008/0508/190508.html

Posted by google at 11:44 PM | Comments (0)

Dalai Lama In Germany, "Sad" About China Quake

Published: Friday, 16 May, 2008

The Dalai Lama (L) and President of the German lower house of parliament Bundestag, Norbert Lammert answer reporter's questions during a news conference at a hotel in Bochum, May 15, 2008. REUTERS/Volker Hartmann/Pool (GERMANY)
Frankfurt, Germany, 15 May 2008 (by Madeline Chambers, Reuters) - The Dalai Lama, Tibet's exiled spiritual leader, on Thursday expressed sadness at the deaths of at least 20,000 Chinese in an earthquake and announced a prayer meeting for the victims. He arrived in Frankfurt to begin a five-day tour of Germany, his first visit to Europe since unrest in Tibetan areas of China in March triggered riots, killings, mass arrests and accusations by Beijing that the Dalai Lama was responsible for the uprising. "(The Chinese earthquake victims are) also human beings, (they suffer) the same pain so as soon as we heard that and also saw pictures ... in Dharamsala, we really felt very, very sad," he said at an impromptu news conference shortly after landing.

"And we are going to organise a prayer meeting, I think today or tomorrow, in Dharamsala," he said.

Chinese troops marched into Tibet in 1950. The Dalai Lama fled the region in 1959 after a failed uprising against communist rule and is now based in Dharamsala in India. He calls for more autonomy for Tibet rather than full independence.

Representatives of the Dalai Lama held talks with Chinese officials this month. The exiled Tibetan leader said on Thursday he hoped Chinese President Hu Jintao would show "more seriousness" about the meetings.

"Hopefully, eventually, some genuine constructive understanding of the discussion can take place," he said.

A political row has erupted in Germany over the visit as senior figures including Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier and President Horst Koehler have declined to meet the Dalai Lama.

They may have been put off by the storm which erupted last year when Chancellor Angela Merkel received him in Berlin and soured relations with China for months.

Merkel will not meet the Dalai Lama this time as she is travelling to Latin America. However, the government has announced that cabinet minister Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul, responsible for development issues, will meet him on Monday.

The news drew criticism from the Chinese embassy in Berlin.

"The Dalai Lama is a political griper who has been engaged in separatist activities for a long time," said an embassy spokesman, adding any meeting with a member of the German government would be a "wrong signal".

http://www.dalailama.com/news.249.htm

Posted by google at 11:40 PM | Comments (0)

Dalai Lama offers help to the Chinese

Sara Hashash

THE Dalai Lama, Tibet’s spiritual leader, has made a gesture of goodwill to China by announcing that he wants to donate to the Chinese earthquake fund, despite Beijing’s denunciations of the “Dalai clique” and its description of him as “a demon”.

In an interview with The Sunday Times, he said he was worried that a gift to the victims would be misunderstood by China, which accuses him of helping to foment the riots that struck Tibet in March.

The Dalai Lama, who is due to meet Gordon Brown in London this week, adopted a conciliatory tone in his remarks on China, giving strong backing for the Olympics and expressing his desire to become a fully fledged Chinese citizen. “At the moment I am a refugee. But I would like to return to Tibet as a member of China’s Tibetan minority,” he said.

Although many of his supporters have called for a boycott of the Olympics, the Dalai Lama said he would have liked to attend them. “It is right that China should have been awarded them,” he said. “It has the world’s largest population and a great and ancient culture. In normal circumstances I would very much like to have gone to Beijing as a spectator.”

Related Links
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The Dalai Lama also showed a deep-rooted desire to return to Tibet and begin a new life as a monk in a monastery. Aged 72, he predicted that he would retire to a life of tranquillity by the time he was 80: “As soon as the situation does improve and I am able to return to Tibet, I will immediately renounce all legitimate authority.”

However, he made it clear that he could not go home before China granted Tibet access to the world’s media, medical aid from overseas, the release of all political prisoners and the exercise of human rights.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/china/article3953902.ece

Posted by google at 11:36 PM | Comments (0)

May 18, 2008

Fed Up With Peace

By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

XIAHE, China

A Tibetan monk, recently out of jail and still in pain from beatings by the police, said he reveres the Dalai Lama but also regards him as a political failure.

“We think the Dalai Lama has been too peaceful,” he said. “There is a big discussion now about whether we should turn to violence.”

Another monk at Labrang Monastery here in Xiahe on the Tibetan plateau put it this way: “For 50 years, the Dalai Lama said to use peaceful means to solve the problems, and that achieved nothing. China just criticizes him.”

“After he’s gone,” the monk added, “there definitely will be violent resistance.”

This impatience seems widespread among young Tibetans, and the rioting and protests across ethnic Tibetan areas of China in the last couple of months may be a turning point. Unless the Tibet question is resolved, we may see a Tibetan equivalent of the Irish Republican Army or Hamas.

A harsh crackdown is under way in greater Tibet, as I found when I slipped into these Tibetan areas in the back of a car with local license plates. China’s heavy hand is adding to the antagonisms: the authorities are beating monks, confiscating pictures of the Dalai Lama, and forcing monks to attend “patriotic study” classes — up to two hours a day, six days a week — full of propaganda praising the Communist Party and denouncing the Dalai Lama.

“That just turns us against China more than ever,” one monk said.

The gulf between Tibetans and the Han Chinese ethnic majority has never been greater. The television images of Tibetans in Lhasa attacking Chinese civilians — devoid of any context of decades of repression — left many Chinese more hard-line than the Communist Party.

“Most of us think that the policy toward Tibetans has been too soft,” said a Han Chinese man in Qinghai Province who often travels in Tibetan areas. “They get all kinds of special preferences, but they’re just not as hard-working, and they drink too much. And then after we help them so much, they riot against us. So most of us think the policy toward Tibetans should be stricter.”

The recent uprising by Tibetans underscores the utter failure of Beijing’s policies in Tibet. But it also reflects the failure of the Dalai Lama and of America.

The Dalai Lama has played a waiting game, but as China gains global power — and as more Han Chinese flood into Tibet — that has been a losing strategy. The Dalai Lama has won acclaim internationally, but that acclaim triggers the deep Chinese sensitivity to foreign bullying and thus has antagonized the audience that may count the most: China.

The Dalai Lama missed opportunities by neglecting outreach by General Secretary Hu Yaobang in 1981, by spurning an invitation to China in 1989 and by announcing the choice of the Panchen Lama in a way that Beijing felt insulting. When the Dalai Lama and those around him refer to “genocide” or claim roughly one-quarter of China as Tibet, they undercut Chinese moderates.

As for the United States, it may have made things worse. Melvyn Goldstein of Case Western Reserve University, whose book “The Snow Lion and the Dragon” remains the best introduction to Tibet, writes that the United States has hurt the interests of Tibetans: its symbolic gestures have encouraged unrealistic Tibetan dreams of independence, and Washington has neglected the serious diplomatic work — both with China and with the Dalai Lama — that might actually improve the lives of Tibetans.

Both China and the Dalai Lama exaggerate, and the historical evidence about Tibet is contradictory. One can make a good case that Tibet has been a part of China at least since 1720. One can also make a good case that Tibet became independent around 1911. The evidence is simply mixed.

A deal to resolve the Tibet question is still attainable. The Dalai Lama would have to put aside claims to vast areas outside the present “Tibet Autonomous Region,” and he would have to accept much less political autonomy than he wants. China would have to ease religious controls and allow the Dalai Lama to return as a spiritual leader. Most important, Beijing would have to end Han Chinese migration to all Tibetan areas, to preserve their Tibetan character.

The upshot would be a Tibet that would be under China’s thumb, but with greater religious freedom — and with real hope of remaining authentically Tibetan through this century. And China would improve its international image and avoid the risk of Tibetan terrorism.

President Bush would do far more for the Tibetan people if, instead of just being photographed with the Dalai Lama, he assigned a top-notch diplomat like Christopher Hill to explore such a compromise.

Time is running out, however, for at this rate, Shangri-La may become a breeding ground for terrorists.

I invite you to comment on this column on my blog, www.nytimes.com/ontheground, and join me on Facebook at

www.facebook.com/kristof

Posted by google at 10:06 PM | Comments (0)

May 11, 2008

http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2004/08/the-words-you-never-see-in-chinese-cyberspace/

A List of Censored Words in Chinese Cyberspace
It is an open secret that all Chinese Internet hosting services, including wireless and instant messenger services, filter user communication through key word blocking mechanisms. But overly vague and broad Chinese internet laws and the internet police force never made the forbidden words explicit — Not until some Chinese hackers located a document within the installation package of QQ instant messaging software. The file contains over one thousand words, most of them in Chinese, which will be blocked by the service.

Owned by Tencent, QQ is China’s most popular Instant Messenger service. On a regular basis, tens of millions of users use their service. On one day, March 13 , there were more than six million users online using QQ at the same time. Because of its high traffic volume, it is technically much harder to build in the key word filtering mechanism on the server’s end. Instead, Tencent sneaked in a filtering program file in their installation package at the client end. When a client installs the QQ2003 software on their own computer desktop, a program file, called COMToolKit.dll, is automatically included. This file contains all the forbidden keywords, which will be automatically blocked when the client runs QQ. The full list is below.

Recently, some Chinese hackers located this file and released it on the Internet. The censored key words list is commonly used not just for QQ, but also for all websites, BBS and text messaging services. One Internet user did a rough breakdown of the list: About 15% of the words are sex related, the rest are all related to politics. About 20% of the words are Falungong related, including “师父”(master) and “弟子” (disciple); about 15% are names of current officials and their relatives; about 10% are words used in the liberal political discourse such as “democracy”, “freedom”, and “dictatorship”; and about 5% are related to certain nationalistic issues, such as“保钓”(defend Diaoyu Island),“中俄边界” (Sino-Russian Border) ,“卖国”(selling out the country) etc. About 15% of the forbidden words are related to anti-corruption, such as ，“走私”（smuggling） ,“公款”（public funds） etc. Other censored words include names of dissidents, writers, and intellectuals, and names of certain foreign publications. Please find the entire list attached here:

From Program Files\Tencent\QQGame\COMToolKit.dll:

Posted by google at 03:24 PM | Comments (0)

Kong Lingxi: A Chinese Student’s Interview With the Dalai Lama

Lingxi Kong (孔灵犀) is a fourth year student majoring in Greek and Latin at Columbia University. He met with the Dalai Lama on April 24, 2008, and wrote an essay recounting the meeting. The Chinese version has spread widely on the Internet, both inside and outside of China now. The following English text is also written by the author and is published by CDT with his permission:

After the turmoil in early March, China’s media heavily attacked the Dalai Lama as the sponsor of violence in Tibet, setting off a surge of nationalistic reactions among Chinese students and immigrants around the globe. Has the whole world been hoodwinked by the simple monk, or have we built up blind hatred based on distorted information? Either way, as a student supporting the Olympic Games and an individual who is determined to make contributions to the Harmonious Society, I do not wish to see Chinese and Tibetan people hating each other due to lack of necessary communication. With some questions and advice, I came to Colgate University and met with the Dalai Lama in a private house on April 24th, 2008.

In fact, after watching the turmoil in Lhasa on the Internet, some friends and I organized a panel discussion on Tibet in the International Affairs Building at Columbia University, where we included not only Tibetan speakers such as the Dalai Lama’s representative to the United States, the Director of Tibetan Youth Congress in US, but also scholars such as the Director of Modern Tibetan Studies at Columbia, as well as a political analyst representing the views of the Chinese government. It has been our firm belief that the best way to resolve bias and misunderstanding is through free exchange of ideas among people with different perspectives from all walks of life. The discussion lasted for three hours, with around one hundred and eighty attendees, including some of my friends and classmates, who, even at that time, had expressed their wish to hear the Dalai Lama’s positions towards the Olympic Games, Tibet’s future and the Youth Congress.

So on April 22nd, I zigzagged through the highway system without satellite signals, and managed to arrive at the very beautiful upstate institute, Colgate University, where His Holiness was giving a lecture on “happiness.” Five thousand eager faces crowded in the lecture hall where a fresh energy was surging through the air. Sitting in the ballroom between two large screens, he spoke slowly in a sincere manner. Despite making some occasional grammar mistakes, he was clearly a man of swift intelligence and great personal charisma. During the two-hour lecture, the main theme was always about compassion, pity, tolerance, understanding and forgiveness. After the event, when the audience was slowly dissolving into the beautiful campus with contented smiles, I saw twenty Chinese students waving national flags outside the lecture hall and shouting “We’re one family, don’t break it!” Due to a sore throat, I couldn’t engage in more communication with my fellow students, but I thought when seeing the Dalai Lama I would ask some serious questions that we all care about.

On the 24th, in Colgate Inn, a beautiful hotel with classic renaissance style decorations, after meeting several Buddhist students, the Dalai Lama was going to hold a news conference with Chinese media, including the Xinhua News Agency. He shook hands with each journalist as he walked into the small conference room, where some fifteen journalists representing ten media groups had set up their equipment behind the chairs. A female journalist not knowing the proper etiquette put a hada over his neck. Throughout the press conference, he explained his commitment to non-violence, his support to the ‘greater unity’ between Han Chinese and Tibetans, his promise of not-seeking-independence and his support for the Games, which he wishes to attend.

Finally at noon, we were led to the front yard of a two-floored house where a security check was operated in a friendly manner by some officers who, after asking where I am studying, were a little surprised by being boldly asked back where they are working. They were not those legendary CIA agents, but working for the State Department. At the door, the Dalai Lama and a Tibetan monk along with some staff from the delegation greeted us. Following Tibetan custom, I shook hands with His Holiness and offered him a hada which represents purity; he pronounced “huan ying (welcome)” in Chinese, inviting me to sit down on the sofa. I mentioned that the feverish emotions displayed by people discussing the Tibet issue are perhaps due to the limited information received and the lack of real heart-to-heart communication between Chinese and Tibetans, especially the younger generations. I was hoping to hear his opinions.

The Dalai Lama felt that this is a serious moment as both sides are too emotional, and explained the Tibetan sentiments from a historical perspective. Before Yuan Dynasty, Tibet remained relatively independent, not being part of any central administration. Even since Yuan Dynasty, from Tibetan point of view, the relationship between the emperors of China and Tibet is not like that between a subject and a ruler, but like the relationship between a priest and a patron. Tibet was an independent nation before the Liberation Army entered Tibet. Before 1949, taxes were not collected in Tibetan areas. Occasionally, some Chinese came like warlords and collected money, and created some trouble, burning down some monasteries, but the essential Tibetan life remained the same; there was no control or restrictions. After 1949, since the Liberation Army came representing the new government, of course very powerful and organized, Tibetan life in every field had some kind of interference or control. So in 1956, the reform started in the common area, which was good and necessary, but the manner of the reform, mainly class struggle, carrying the same manner as in the mainland, and was simply unfit for Tibet. Unlike that in mainland China, the relationship between landlord and peasants was generally like that between parents and children, with landlords often showing great compassion and care. During the reform, landlords were thrown into prisons, and in some cases serfs beat the landlords. In other cases serfs remained silent and kept crying. Then resentment came, and uprising started, from Tibet to Xikang in 1956 and 57, and then spread to the whole area in 1957 and 58. Numerous Tibetans were killed. A notebook that the Tibetans obtained from a Chinese military officer says that from March 1959 to September 1960, eighty-seven thousand Tibetans lost their lives in Lhasa. Several thousand Chinese soldiers were also killed. The whole event was “very very sad”.

In 1954 the Dalai Lama and the Panchen Lama both as representatives of the National People’s Congress went to Beijing and other cities from central Tibet. He displayed a moving voice when he remembered the scenes: “Chairman Mao was a great person, talking slowly with me, and very dignified, each word, occasionally some coughing, is really wonderful. I was so much impressed. During that period I also had opportunities to visit some heavy industries—since childhood, I had a keen interest in mechanical things, so I was interested in visiting big factories. At local places, party secretaries, vice secretaries, provincial governors and majors dined with us, drinking Maotai (the most famous Chinese liquor), though I couldn’t drink. I met all levels of officials and party members, many of which participated in the Long March. At that time, I was very interested in Marxism, so when I was in Beijing, I told communist party officials that I want to join the communist party. They told me to ‘wait a little bit’. In the summer of 1955, I left Beijing for Lhasa, and met Commander Zhang Guohua en route, a very nice person, Comrade Zhang Guohua, who was traveling from Lhasa to Beijing. I told him, ‘last year when I was traveling from Lhasa to Beijing, my heart was full of doubt and anxiety, but traveling on the same road back to Tibet now, I am full of confidence and hope.’

“At that time, not only I myself wanted to join the Communist Party, there were also several hundred Tibetans who already joined the Communist Party during the 30s and 40s. I knew a Tibetan Communist from my hometown, who had some injuries on the nose, who proudly stated to us that it was due to a Japanese bullet, because he participated in the Sino-Japanese war; he was a member of the Communist guerilla force. I was not a communist but almost like an alternate member. Now those Chinese, unlike previous Chinese, are revolutionary-minded, very caring about brotherhood, socialism and equality. The nationalists and the Manchurians always made differences between minorities. But these Tibetan communists really felt proud of being communists and part of People’s Republic of China. Chairman Mao made the Seventeen Points, in which one point mentioned Military and Political Committee. We were very afraid seeing the word ‘military’, but when we saw the frame of autonomy, everyone was very happy. Then in the year of 1956, Autonomic Region Preparation Committee was founded. Foreign Minister and Martial Chen Yi, who addressed up as a Martial in a big ceremony, actually, it was he who emphasized the importance of establishing a unified autonomous region. So what we refer to as “all Tibetan area”, which includes the whole Tibet, part of Sichuan,Qinghai, Gansu and Xikang, was first promised by Chen Yi.”

Telling from the Dalai Lama’s feelings and sentiments, he showed true sincerity in reminiscing about those veteran revolutionaries of the Communist Party, and cherished very much the relationship with the central government. I think without the Dalai Lama’s influence and advocacy for non-violence, it would not have been possible for people living in the area, where the Dalai Lama is being worshiped as the Living Buddha, to live without long-term, large-scale violence and bloodshed. On the other hand, if the Chinese government could heed the reasons and sentiments behind the long-standing resentment of the Tibetan people, so as to deal with Tibetan affairs with greater flexibility, then “Tibetan loyalty to Han Chinese will naturally come.”

While I was having a moment’s reflection, his staff reminded us that His Holiness had to go to the airport soon. So I hurried to proceed to the next part, which was the main purpose of my trip: seeking the creation of multiple communicative channels for exchange of views between Chinese and Tibetan people, which is of crucial importance for “minzu da tuanjie” (Great Unity of Ethnic Groups). I proposed to initiate an open-letter exchange between Chinese and Tibetan students, to be posted on a website with translations in both English and Chinese, so that both peoples (and the whole world) can explore each other’s feelings and sentiments. Television debate(s) may also be held between overseas Chinese and Tibetan students on an American television channel. He enthusiastically endorsed those proposals, adding that in times of crisis, instead of being antagonistic or hating each other, people may discuss and explore what is really happening. I also mentioned that a very good friend of mine, who is a computer scientist, volunteered to make documentary films on the life of Tibetan settlements in India. He was very happy to hear about it and asked his delegation to give full support. His Holiness also accepted the advice that whenever he visits a place abroad, he should meet local Chinese students and immigrants, promote the exchange of views and clear up misunderstandings, and accumulate grassroots support from Han Chinese.

Even in terms of the “Greater Tibetan Area”, he showed much room for further discussion. I advised him to return Tibet at any price, for the creation of two Dalai Lamas would not only bring too much controversy, but violence would also ensue, as his non-violence influence would fade and a Lamaist church outside Tibet would be accused of being out-of-touch. So a high degree of flexibility should be maintained, if not to abandon entirely the idea of “Greater Tibetan Area”. He responded that he welcomes any discussion regarding the issue, but the Tibetan people living in other areas have put all their hope, support and trust in him. Also in regard to language and culture, people living in Tibet and other areas are inseparable. What he hopes is that Tibetan people themselves make decisions on internal affairs, that the main posts in local Tibetan government should consist of Tibetans who know the language and culture, so positive outcomes may be ensured for protection of their religion, environment and the unique cultural identity. As for himself, he will not assume any position and will go into complete retirement, handing over all his authority to the local government after returning to Tibet. I think since the Chinese government successfully solved the Hong Kong and Macao issues with great political wisdom, ensuring their continued political stability and economic prosperity, would these also provide any experience or insights towards China’s Tibet policies? Under the Dalai Lama’s repeated promise of not seeking independence, the possibility of “Tibet governed by Tibetans” should enjoy plenty of room for consideration. Even if some details were disputed and hard to settle immediately, any constructive discussions and meaningful communications between China and His Holiness would be extremely worthwhile.

Due to time-constraints, I asked only five questions out of the nine ones that I prepared:

1. Do you seek independence? Why? He emphatically answered: “No! For our own interests. Economically, a strong China provides much benefit to six million Tibetans who may live much better and much happier joining China for another thousand years.”

2. Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Jiang Yu said at a press conference on April 8: “The Dalai Lama is the head representative of the serf system, which integrated religion with politics in old Tibet. The ‘middle way’ approach that the Dalai Lama is pursuing is aimed at restoring his own ‘paradise in the past’, which will throw millions of liberated serfs back into a dark cage.” So do you seek theocratic serfdom? He answered, smiling: “I think since many years, as everybody knows, that we never aim to restore the old system, and even the Dalai Lama institution, as early as 69, I made clear that this institution should continue or not is up to people.”

3. Chinese media portrays the Tibetan Youth Congress as a terrorist organization that supports violence, and also accuses Your Holiness and the Tibetan Youth Congress of operating on two sides together to split China. How would you explain this situation, and what’s your relationship with the Tibetan Youth Congress? “At the beginning, we thought the Youth Congress was very important, just like any youth organization in a community—youth is the basis of the future. But around 1974, we made up our mind that we will return to China, so independence is out of the question. Therefore, we must find a middle-way, not the present situation, nor independence or separation. But gradually, the Youth Congress becomes very critical towards our position of not seeking independence and separation. So right from the beginning (of course they are Tibetans and Buddhists who often come to see me), I made it clear that your stance is very different from ours. I also often criticize them because they’re not realistic.”

4. When you pass away and the new Dalai Lama is still young, based on what you know, who would most likely assume your position of advocating the ‘middle-way’ appeals? Also, do you think that Tibetan people will accept the China appointed Panchen Lama? “Hopefully, I think I may not be dealing with the question of my reincarnation. As for the two Panchen Lamas, I think the official one Tibetans generally are not very faithful to, so it’s for our mutual interest to avoid such controversies.”

5. China has made many investments in Tibet in the last fifty years. In your opinion, from now on, in Tibet, what are the most important things that China and international groups should devote their financial resources to? “The local people should get some benefit. That’s very important, and some portion must be shared for the constructions of the local condition: hospitals, schools and some economic projects. That’s I think really important.”

After the meeting, he sincerely stated while holding an Olympic T-shirt: “I feel very happy holding this, because right from the beginning I already support that the famous Olympic Games should take place in the ancient, most populated nation, that is the People’s Republic of China.”

And wrote down the following message in Tibetan:

With an ancient civilization and the greatest population,
I pray that China achieves development and is able to provide
great contribution towards the welfare of the international community.

From the Shakya monk
the Dalai Lama
April 24th 2008

When I returned to school, my Tibetan professor told me that for “China” His Holiness uses the Chinese word “Zhong guo”, the People’s Republic of China, NOT the Tibetan word Gyanag, which means traditional China without Tibet.

The meeting lasted for roughly 75 minutes, and I was deeply impressed by his sincerity and hospitality. His advocacy for non-violence, support for the Games and promise of non-independence are all consistent with what he has said and done in the West. As an ordinary overseas Chinese student, I think not only the future of Tibet requires formal discussions between Chinese government and His Holiness, but to abandon hatred and to promote harmony between Chinese and Tibetans also require continuous dialogue and communication between the two peoples, and this is the main purpose of my trip.

http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2008/05/chinese-student-interviewing-the-dalai-lama/

Posted by google at 03:08 PM | Comments (0)

Zhang Boshu: The Way to Resolve the Tibet Issue

(Brief introduction of the author) Zhang Boshu 张博树 was born in Beijing in 1955. He received an
MA in economics from Zhongguo Renmin Daxue in 1982 and in 1985 passed the entrance examination
for the Institute of Philosophy of the graduate school of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. His
research has been on critical theory in continental Europe in modern western philosophy. He obtained
MA and PhD degrees in philosophy in 1988 and 1991. He has held a post in the Philosophy Institute of
the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences from 1991 to the present. In recent years he has striven to
understand the lessons of success and failure in the history of the past century of China's democratic
transition and institutional modernization. He has gradually settled upon criticism of 20th Century
Chinese despotism as his main research topic.
Ever since March, the issue of Tibet and the Olympics have been stirred up together, drawing the
attention of the entire world. Short sighted politicians in our own country have been pleased that their
petty schemes to stir up nationalist sentiment have been so successful. This not only manipulates
domestic opinion but also uses so-called "mainstream public opinion" to stand oppose the criticisms
coming from international society. On the other hand, this serves to push for the consolidation of the
situation in Tibet in the hope of getting through the Olympics peacefully. They did not realize that the
Tibet issue has already become a major factor affecting China's future. Solving the Tibet issue will take
courage and great wisdom. Petty scheming could run Tibet and ruin China.
How did the Tibet issue arise?
The Tibet issue is first of all a human rights issue.
Although the authorities are not willing to admit it, I want to say it plainly. This problem that plagues
the leadership of the Communist Party, if we look at its origin, was created by the Chinese Communist
Party itself as the ruler of China.
We don't have to look too far back in history. Whether in fact from the Yuan Dynasty to the Qing
Dynasty the relationship between the Tibet government and Beijing was one of relatives or of equals is
a matter of dispute among academics. For now, we don't need to pay any attention to controversy.
What is most important as that from 1912 onwards, Tibet was for a long period in a de facto "state of
independence". That situation continued until 1951 when the Tibet local government signed an
agreement with the Beijing central government -- the "Seventeen Point Agreement on the Peaceful
Liberation of Tibet". The document was moderate and constructive. The agreement stressed that Tibet
is part of China but also recognized that Tibet's current system would not change and that the Dalai
Lama's position would not change. We can call that the earliest version of "One Country, Two Systems"
in contemporary China.
In 1954, the 19 year-old Dalai and 16-year old Panchen both went to Beijing to take part in the First
National People's Congress, attending as honored guests of Mao Zedong. They were appointed
respectively as the Vice Chair of the NPC and the Vice Chair of the National People's Consultative
Congress. Tibet's future seemed bright. Problems began to appear in 1955. Mao Zedong's utopian
socialist social transformation began to accelerate that year. Ripples spread from the Chinese interior to
Changdu and the Tibetan areas of Sichuan, Yunnan, Qinghai, and Gansu Provinces. In these areas,
which were not bound by the 17 Point Agreement, "democratic reform" broke out on a spectacular
scale. Radical local Communist Party leaders sought to carry out "democratic reform" and "socialist
transformation" simultaneously so as "to make spectacular progress in just one step". They struck hard
against the masters of the serfs and their "representatives", confiscating the lands and property of
monasteries and forcing collectivization, slandering the religious beliefs of Tibetan people, and forcing
upper class people, lamas and monks to "reform their thinking".
The result was that they stirred up dissatisfaction and resistance among the Tibetan people. During
1956 - 1958, armed conflicts in the Tibetan areas grew larger and larger in scale. When one died out
another arose but were soon were put down by campaigns by the PLA to put down rebellion and wipe
out rebels. Ten of thousands of Kam and Amdo region Tibetans fled across the Jinsha River into Tibet.
This sowed the seeds for the 1959 Lhasa "rebellion". These historical circumstances led to the
"rebellion" and indeed were a necessary condition for that event to occur.
There is no need to go into detail about what happened after that. The victorious "suppression of the
rebellion" at Lhasa showed that the central government had achieved absolute control of all the Tibetan
areas including Tibet itself. It also marked the rapid move of Tibet towards "socialism". Chinese of
my age grew up hearing songs like "The Red Sun is rising about the snowy mountains" and seeing
movies like "Serfs". In those days we really believed that under the leadership of the Communist Party
"the serfs have been liberated" and were living happy lives. Later, after reading a lot of historical
materials, I learned that there were many untruths in the propaganda.
The dictatorship system of the Communist Party, the arrogance and ignorance of leaders, and the
extreme leftist policies pursued by them in the Tibetan areas brought terrible disasters to both the
religious and lay people of Tibet. In 1962, the Panchen Lama, who was ranked as a "national leader"
wrote a letter to Premier Zhou Enlai expressing his deep sorrow at what he had seen and heard of the
suffering of the Tibetan people. Since the Panchen Lama was certainly not opposed to the leadership
of the Communist Party, and was loyally and faithfully reporting to the Party the actual situation in the
Tibetan areas, this letter called the "70,000 Character Document" can be seen as a document that
accurately reflects the difficult situation of the Tibetan people during those years. I might as well quote
from it here:
--- On "class struggle" in the Tibetan areas: "In most or in many areas, the cadres didn't care if the
campaign was planned or carried out well. They were intent on making a spectacular display that would
strike terror in people. They didn't care if they attacked the right people. The objective was to do the
campaign on a big scale and achieve numerical targets." They attacked many people whom they
shouldn't have attacked. Often “those who were the objects of struggle meetings had not done anything
particularly bad or committed serious errors. So they had to make up many false and serious
accusations. They exaggerated at will, turning truth and falsehood upside down." Many innocent
people were forced to flee abroad against their will. Those who stayed behind lived in terror."
-- On the lives of the people in the Tibetan areas: "Because of the rise in the agricultural areas of the
five unhealthy tendencies [Tr. Note: post Great Leap Forward Party critique of GLF excesses -- wu
feng 五风 – 共产风、浮夸风、瞎指挥风、强迫命令风、特殊化 over-egalitarianism, the
common practice of exaggeration, confused orders, too many compulsory orders, and special
privileges. End note] and excessively tight controls on grain, and the standards for the amount of grain
the people could retain was set too low, a severe grain shortage resulted, ...and many households had no
grain. In some areas some people even starved to death. "Formerly Tibet was a dark and barbarous
feudal society but there had never been a shortage of grain like that, especially since Buddhism
permeated the society, everyone rich and poor, had the custom of helping the poor and giving alms.
People could easily support themselves as a beggar, so we never of anyone ever having starved to
death."
-- Implementation of "dictatorship" resulted in the improper deaths of many prisoners: After the
"suppression of the rebellion", the proportion of prisoners in the Tibetan population reached several
percent, something completely unprecedented. " In 1959, Chairman Mao set forth a policy that since
the population of Tibet was small, people shouldn't be killed or at most only a few people should be
killed. But in fact, just the opposite happened. Except for the somewhat better treatment of
imprisoned members of the upper classes, most people who were locked up in prison endured very bad
conditions. The prison wardens didn't care about the lives or health of the prisoners. They often
verbally abused and savagely beat prisoners. Moreover, wardens deliberately moved prisoners back
and forth between very warm and cold places so that the prisoners could not adapt and their clothes
were always unsuitable. Their clothes could not keep them warm, their mattresses were not waterproof,
and the wind and rain entered their cells. They never got enough to eat, living in miserable conditions
yet they still had to get up early to do work. The hardest work was always given to these people. Their
became worn out physically, often came down with diseases. As a result of no rest and inadequate
medical care, many prisoners died who they should not have. (Tr. Note. Chinese text: 非正常之死）
On religion and nationalities issues: "Under the so-called "elimination of superstition", the first
priority was opposing religion. The second priority was destroying images of the Buddha, Buddhist
scriptures, and stupas." When they demanded that monks and nuns return to secular lives, they "first
in all the temples and monasteries, under the pretext of "study" and "mobilization", they brought all the
monks and nuns together into a large hall or room, and made them study nervously day and night,
forcing them to criticize each other in order to create a big wave of sharp struggles and attacks. People
who openly express their belief in religion were given labels such as a superstitious element or
someone who doesn't like the revolution. They were constantly attacked without rhyme or reason.
Even worse, in some places they made the lamas stand on one side and nuns and lay religious women
stand on the other. They were then forced to chose each other in marriage. In Tibet, there were
originally over 2500 temples. After "democratic reform" there were only 70 left. Originally there were
110,000 monks and nuns. Ten thousand fled abroad, leaving 100,000 behind. After "democratic
reform" there were only 7000 monks and nuns left. What especially cannot be condoned is that in
some areas there was deliberate desecration and insults to religion such as the Buddhist Canon used for
compost. Many paintings of the Buddha and scriptures were used to make shoes or other objects.
There is absolutely no reason for this. Because there were many insane things done that even a lunatic
wouldn't do, people in all classes of Tibetan society were deeply shaken. Their emotions were in chaos
and they became exceedingly sad and shed tears. They said "Our land has been made into a dark
place." quoting a Tibetan proverb that means "a place without religion".
Alas, when I read these characters, my own heart bleeds and my face burns.
Most of these problems also existed in the Chinese interior as well. But they were more serious in
Tibet. They were more extreme and more widespread there. No matter how well-meaning or noble the
initial motivation of those in power was to use their social ideals to transform Tibetan society was, what
its shocking results are all crimes. These are crimes that resulted from ignorance, arrogance, rage and
violence.
Under these circumstances, the over 100,000 Tibetans who fled to India and other foreign countries
called upon the entire world to support the human rights of Tibetans. Therefore the Tibet issue became
a symbolic issue for the entire world. What can be surprising about that? Moreover, this was going on
during the Cold War and so in the minds of western people, Tibet became a focal point in the game of
competing national interests in which china, the Soviet Union, India, the United States and other
countries were engaged.
The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency did in fact provide funding, technical and other support to
Tibetans in exile. That was part of the effort of the United States to contain the "spread of
communism". Chinese can of course curse the damn Americans for plotting to "split China" without
revealing their real intentions. But on the other hand, if the Communist Party had not done so many
stupid things in Tibet and forced Tibetans to flee into exile, what would other people have been able to
say? What pretext could they have to butt in? I haven't even mentioned the Cultural Revolution. That
"historically unprecedented” "revolution" because it was even redder and even further left, it was even
more extreme and more cruel. Of course it created even greater disasters for the Tibetan people. I
won't discuss them here.
Enlightened Communist Party Leaders Once Reflected on the "Leftist" Misfortunes that
Brought Disaster to Tibet
Objectively speaking, there has been no shortage of enlightened people within the Chinese Communist
Party leadership. At different times and in different positions they have opposed leftist work methods in
Tibet. However, under these historical circumstances, they could achieve only limited results.
Xi Zhongxun, from northwestern China, was a Vice Premier and Secretary General of the State Council
in the 1960s. He was responsible for contact with the Panchen. He made a very complete report to the
State Council about the how the "Seventy Thousand Character Document" came to be written by the
Panchen and so was charged with "accommodating and not interfering with the Panchen. The Tenth
session of the Eighth Congress of the Communist Party dismissed Xi Zhongxun and, in addition to the
major crime of "using a novel to attack the Communist Party" was also charged with "accommodating
and not interfering with the Panchen."
Another dismissed, high level Communist Party official was Li Weihan, who was an old communist
who had been head of the United Front Department since 1947. During April and May 1962, at a
Nationalities Work Conference held in Beijing, some of the nationalities religious figures offered some
sharp criticisms. Li Weihan remained calmly and honestly said that he welcomed criticism from
everyone. He praised the talk of the Tibetan Buddhist Lama Xijiashenzhi [romanization of Chinese
name], saying that he was "open and above board, with a heart as clear as a mirror" and stands as a
symbol of "patriotism in the area of national minorities religious affairs". Li Weiquan's action was later
severely criticized by Mao Zedong who said that "The United Front Department is neglecting the class
struggle and is being capitulationist." 2
After the end of the Cultural Revolution, many issues in Tibetan affairs were neglected. Nationalities
policy and the relationship between the Han nationality and the Tibetan nationality needed to be
adjusted and the lives of Tibetans needed to be improved. In May 1980, just after Hu Yaobang had
become General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, Hu and Wan Li flew to Tibet for an
inspection visit. On the plane, Hu said to the accompanying Xinhua News Agency journalists "In our
policies in the national minority areas, we must always seek truth from facts, and adjust measures to
suit local conditions so as to fully respect the autonomy the Tibetans have to govern their minority area
themselves. That is the crux of all the Tibet issues." On May 29, in the work report that Hu Yaobang
presented at the meeting with the cadres of the Tibetan Autonomous Region, he stressed that the
development of Tibetan must resolve "six big issues".
The first is, under the unified leadership of the center, fully implement the autonomy rights in the
nationalities areas. "Any document, order or regulation which is not suitable for the conditions of Tibet
should not be implemented." "You should according to your own characteristics, draft specific decrees,
laws and regulations, and rules to protect the special interests of your own nationality." The second is
"Under the present difficult conditions of Tibet, you should carry out a policy of recuperation and
rebuilding and considerably reduce the burden on the people." "We have decided that within several
years required purchases by Tibetans will be abolished." Third, Tibet should implement special flexible
policies to promote the development of production." Fourthly "Devote the resources that the state is
providing to Tibet to the development of agriculture and herding and the daily necessities most needed
by Tibetan people." Fifth, "With the condition that the socialist road be followed, develop science,
technology and education in Tibet."
Hu Yaobang especially stressed, "Looking down on Tibetan history, language and art is totally wrong...
Loving the minority people is not a matter of empty words. Their social customs and habits must be
respected. Respect their language, respect their history, respect their culture. If you don't do that you
are only speaking empty words." Finally, Tibetan cadres should manage Tibet. Within two years,
Tibetans should make up two-thirds or more of the cadres in Tibet. "We have been here for thirty years.
We have completed our historical mission." "Today there are 300,000 ethnic Han, including military, in
Tibet. How can that ever do?" The above can be summarized in six characters "cut taxes, open up, and
withdraw personnel". These were the "emergency measures" energetically promoted by Hu Yaobang to
resolve the Tibet issue. 3
These views, strong criticisms of social evils, were enthusiastically welcomed in the Tibetan areas. Of
course because of historical conditions, the enlightened leaders of the Chinese Communist Party were
unable to discuss and consider institutional perspectives on the problems that occurred in Tibet. Hu
Yaobang in his May 29th speech said that we should not look back on the past but rather "unify
ourselves and look to the future".4 This reflects Hu Yaobang's experience and resourcefulness and the
frustrations of a generation of reformers in the Chinese Communist Party. After all, the many of the
tragedies in contemporary Tibetan history are directly linked to the Communist Party system and the
social policies that that Party carried out. This is all a result of these policies. If we do not reflect upon
the origins of the Tibet issue, then we will not be able to resolve it.
New Symptoms Arose in the Tibet Issue During the Years of Reform
With opening and reform, especially since the early 1990s and the turn of the new century, the Chinese
economy has grown very quickly. The central government has also certainly invested a lot of capital in
Tibet and devised a series of special preferential policies and measures to accelerate the development of
Tibet. There have been direct state investment construction projects, Chinese central government
financial subsidies, and support for projects from partners around the country for the modernization and
construction of Tibet. The overall economic level of Tibet improved considerably as a result. However
the political structure remained the same as before with the Party exercising control over political,
economic, cultural, and religious affairs just as before. An autonomous region in name, but in actual
fact, autonomy was in the same lamentable state as before. The core of the Tibet issue has not been
truly solved, and under the new social conditions a variety of new problems have arisen.
The market economy has become the economy controlled by influential people. It is that way in the
Chinese interior, and it is that way in Tibet. The blending of the system of Party dictatorship and the
policy of opening up created a new privileged stratum that includes Han and as well as Tibetans who
have positions in Party and government institutions and cultural institutions. Faced with swarms of
merchants coming from the Chinese interior, many ordinary Tibetans in Lhasa and other areas fell
discriminated against and marginalized.
Even worse is the all encompassing control of religious affairs. On the surface, religious life in Tibet
has already been restored. The state spent great sums repairing damage and protecting symbolic
Buddhist structures, the temples are filled with burning incense. The Buddhist Canon will never again
be used for compost. But this is just the surface of things. There is a deeper reality that is hidden behind
these things as if beneath a mask.
The independent scholar Wang Lixiong, who has done much research, including many research trips to
Tibet. His conclusion: in Tibet there is no true religious freedom. On one hand, the government
strictly controls the registration of religious activities in the temples, limits religious personnel to a
certain "authorized personnel complement", and forbids ties between temples. Religious activities
outside the temples are forbidden. On the other hand, spontaneous religious activities outside
government control are rigorously suppressed so that they will not have any influence.
In the Kang region of [Tr. note: ethnographic] Tibet, not far from the county seat of Sela County, is the
mountain valley of Larong with its Wuming Buddhist Institute. [Translator's note: also known as the
Sertar Tibetan Buddhist Institute, Sertar, Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan, China 四川
甘孜州色达县喇荣五明佛学院 End note.] When founded in 1980, there were only 30 or so people
at the Institute. At the end of the 1990s, there were nearly 10,000 Tibetan and Han monks there. This
worried the Chinese government. The authorities ordered that the reduce the number of its personnel
from the authorized number of 4000 nuns to just 400 and 4000 monks to just 1000. All the 1000 Han
who had come to study Buddhism were forced to leave. This requirement was rejected by the Living
Buddha who ran the Institute because to make a monk return to secular life involves a serious violation
of vows. The government took action, sending people to destroy the housing of the monks. On July
10, 2001 during the height of the destruction of monastic housing, 1700 monastic cells were destroyed
in a single day. "I have heard people describe that scene, the sounds of houses being destroyed, the
dust rising up everywhere, on one side one thousand nuns crying, as if the world itself were shaking. In
the area around the Wuming Buddhist Academy were many nuns in groups in the countryside hiding
out to avoid pursuit by the government. "5
An even more deadly consequence of the strict control of religion have been breaks in the transmission
of Tibetan Buddhism. Traditional Tibetan religion has an internal control mechanism. For example,
although their is a reincarnation system for the Dalai and the Panchen, but in the Geluga School,
eminent monks and heads of monasteries have a set term of office. They are chosen from among the
most learned lamas. The winners in the competition can become the head of the Ganden Monastery --
that is a natural teacher for the Dalai Lama and the Panchen Lama. This system has continued for
several hundred years without a break, thereby ensuring the authenticity in the transmission of the
teachings of Tibetan Buddhism from generation to generation and ensuring as well the excellent
character of eminent monks. But since 1959 this continuous process has been interrupted. From the
1980s to the present, although on the surface religious activities have been renewed, it has become hard
to find a trace of the very core of the religion -- the pious beliefs of eminent monks, deep research into
Buddhism and teaching aimed at enlightening all sentient beings.
The governing authorities operate a "reverse elimination" selection system among the leaders of the
monks. "Any monk leader who insists on religious principles, refuses to be a tool of the authorities,
will be subject to pressure and purging or even sentenced to prison as a warning to other clergy. Any
monk with a relatively high traditional rank who keeps silent, doesn't cause trouble is a candidate for
recruitment by the United Front Department. He will be given rewards but a club will be always be
ready to intimidate them. Any monk willing to be personal advancement first, who is opportunistic,
gives up religious principles, and willing to be a tool of the government will be given all sorts of
advantages, membership in the National People's Congress, the National People's Consultative
Congress or even higher government positions. The green light will be given for their activities,
resources will be provided so that they will be a model who can draw in other leaders among the
monks." In sum, therefore, although the Chinese Communists boast of religious freedom but their
religious policy is aimed at the destruction of Buddhism, no less than it was in the days of Mao
Zedong. Mao Zedong wanted to completely extirpate Buddhism. In Tibetan history there were eras
when Buddhism was extirpated yet Buddhism still continued because the religion lived in the hearts of
believers and so could not be destroyed by an external force. Today the Communist Party religious
policy is aims at the degeneration of the monk stratum of Tibetan society. This is a mortal danger to
Buddhism." 6
As a consequence of all this, although Tibet has made considerable economic progress over the past
thirty years and the lives of ordinary Tibetans have improved, but Tibetans are still dissatisfied and
"events" occur over and over in the Tibetan regions. The Tibetan issue is still "an issue" that is the
focus of constant international attention. Ever since that have occurred since March are just new
developments in the course of this ongoing transformation.
Demonizing the Dalai Lama is Extremely Stupid
After the "hitting, smashing, stealing and burning" event of March 14, the Chinese government
immediately announced that this was instigated by the "Dalai Clique". When in April there was
interference with the transmission of the torch, the authorities again asserted that the "Dalai Clique"
had instigated "Tibet independence elements", with the aim of destroying the Olympic Games, in order
to further the cause of "Tibet independence".
The "human rights issue" was substituted for the "independence issue" to serve the needs of people in
authority. This is easy to see. But in their effort to dump this pile of shit on the head of the Dalai Lama,
we can see how preposterous the traditional political logic of the Chinese communists is. This also
reveals that the rulers lack a long term strategic vision and political wisdom.
The Dalai Lama is the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism. He is also one of the most famous
political figures in the world. The year the Dalai Lama fled Tibet he was 24 years old. In half a
century of exile, this ethnic Tibetan sage has blended the essence of Buddhism, magnanimity, liberal
democracy and other universal values of contemporary civilization. Already in 1987, the Dalai Lama
proposed the "Five Point Peace Proposal" which includes the suggestion that Tibet become a "peace
zone", that "China end its policy of moving settlers into Tibet", "respect for the human rights and
democratic rights of the Tibetan people", "Restore and protect Tibet's natural environment", and "hold
sincere talks about the future status of Tibet and the relationship between the Tibetan people and the
Chinese people".
In 1988, the Dalai Lama also made the "Strasbourg Proposal" in 1988, which proposed that "Tibet
should become a self-ruled democratic political entity in union with the People's Republic of China, in
which "the Chinese government would be responsible for Tibet's external affairs, but Tibet could
establish offices overseas for the religious and cultural aspects of foreign relations" etc.7
During the last seven years, the Dalai Lama has at many times and in many places stated clearly that he
does not seek Tibet independence, only real autonomy for Tibet. On the methods and ways of
achieving this he strongly calls for a peaceful "middle way", which would involve honest dialog with
the central government and negotiations to resolve issues. Ever since 2002, the Dalai Lama's special
envoy has met with representatives of the United Front Department in Beijing six times in order to
explain to the ruling Communist Party rulers the "middle way position" but have not gotten any
response to the proposal.
The rigid stance of the Chinese Communist Party is very easy to understand from their political
tradition: the institutional arrangements for Tibet have already been decided. So what is there to talk
about? Accepting the so-called "autonomy" of the Dalai would shake the foundations of the partystate,
so there can be no yielding on this point. Therefore, "talks" are for the Communist side just a
perfunctory exercise and only done for show, and so of course there can be no concrete results from
them. Yet these delays cause more and more difficulties for the Dalai since he has to explain things to
both the Tibetan exiles and to believers within Tibet.
There are many different organizations and groups among the Tibetans in exile with different political
positions. There are radical ones like the "Tibet Youth Congress" which has attracted a lot of attention
lately. It's political position is very different from the Dalai Lama's "Middle Way". The Tibet Youth
Congress was founded in 1970 mostly by second and third generation Tibet exiles. Membership is now
several tens of thousands with organizations in 40 countries. At the outset the Tibet Youth Congress
stood for non-violence, but is has changed its position over the past several years. At its 2007 annual
meeting, the leader of the Congress said that the non-violence propounded by the Dalai Lama is good,
but he has been saying this for many years without result. "Very many people don't believe in it. They
say it doesn't work." If it doesn't work , then what? The Tibet Youth Congress is inclined to use
violence to solve the problem, including preparing a "popular uprising movement" in the Tibetan areas.
It is said that over 700 Tibetans have volunteered that they are willing to give up their lives to protect
what they "stand for".
The Dalai has stated clearly that he opposes any scheme or action involving the use of violence. He
said that if such an act should occur, he may have to "resign" to show his true position. Several days
ago, the Dalai during an interview with Asia Week [Yazhou Zhoukan] said that he believes that giving
up the Middle Way of giving up efforts to achieve Tibet independence and seeking a high degree of
autonomy is still the mainstream view of Tibetans in exile as well as the mainstream view of people in
the Tibetan areas. As for the Tibet Youth Congress, the Dalai Lama said that he can only admonish the
Tibet Youth Congress not to take the radical road. However, he has no way to order the Tibet Youth
Congress to shut up. 9
Beijing may not completely trust the statements of the Dalai Lama because overcoming political
enmity built up over a long time will take time and face-to-face communication. However,
indiscriminately demonizing the other side, charging that the Dalai is the commander in the "Tibet
independence camp" and should certainly be punished by the entire nation, and reviled by everyone,
can only put the Dalai Lama in a difficult situation (while he is trying to put pressure on radical forces
among Tibetans) and put the Chinese communists into a political dead end (frozen into the rigid face of
the dictator ), giving up the freedom of maneuver needed in political negotiations. Isn't this an
extremely stupid way to behave?!
Yet, in the final analysis, this is the obstinate and stubborn traditional political logic that haunts the
Communist Party. According to this logic, there can be no equal negotiating partners. There can only
be enemies locked in a life and death struggle. Even worse is how the rulers are haunted by their own
logic of interests --- for according to this logic, Tibet "autonomy" is intolerable. It would be a
fundamental threat to the party-state, and a threat to a large group that benefits from this system.
Considered in terms of these two logics, the demonization of the Dalai Lama becomes easy to
understand. But where is justice? What are the prospects for the great family of the peoples of China?
Considering the puerile and shallow "patriotism" and "nationalism" shown in the recent turbulent tide
of meticulously planned and instigated demonstrations in both China and abroad by the new "Boxers",
as well as the very deep problems facing the country, one is left with a bitter and confused taste in
one's mouth and troubled deep into sleepless nights.
The Solution to the Tibet issue Should be Sought Within a Constitutional Framework
The Tibet issue is first of all a human rights issue. But it is not only a human rights issue. Abuses of
human rights are an "effect", not a "cause". An irrational system of political dictatorship is what
caused the "Tibet issue."
Didn't the Communist Party initially seek to help the Tibetan people and the million "liberated serfs"? I
believe that this is true. Yet the history of the world is full of examples of evil deeds done with good
intentions. During the late Qing, the court made great reforms in Tibetan affairs and promoted reforms
in order to prevent the great powers from continuing to encroach upon Tibet. In 1907, Zhang Yintang
gave to the Qing Court "Twenty-four proposals for the governance of Tibet". During 1905 - 1911, in
the the provinces of Sichuan and Kang, a reform to "change from indirect control through local chiefs
to direct control by the central government". The purpose in addition to consolidating Qing rule was to
transform social traditions for the "good of" ordinary Tibetans. However, these "reforms" were
strongly resisted by Tibetan people. Half a century later the Communist Party did the same thing in the
Tibetan areas, albeit more systematically and with more determination. The result was larger scale
harm to the people, religion and culture of the Tibetan areas.
In fact, history has already shown that China's 20th century communist revolution was a mistake. It
was a big wrong turn during a century of social transformation. It not only brought misfortune to the
Han nationality, it also brought misfortune to the minority peoples. Today, people are thinking deeply
about that history. Things that are past cannot be called back. But we should remember the lessons of
history, and look at the issues of today and tomorrow with a scientific attitude. This is the
responsibility of the present generation.
Respect for the fundamental rights of citizens, and respect for the distinctive cultures and traditions
must be implemented in a constitutional political system. This is the basic path for solving the Tibet
issue.
Recently Taiwan successfully changed the ruling party for the second time. This shows the superiority
of the democratic system of government. It also demonstrates the necessity and urgency of changing
the political system on the Chinese mainland. Clearly, the party dictatorship system of the Chinese
Communist Party cannot accommodate unification between Taiwan and the mainland, just as it cannot
accommodate true autonomy for Tibet. Only by dissolving the present system and creating a
constitutional democratic system in accordance with the universal values and principles of modern
civilization can the day come when Taiwan finally returns to the motherland, Tibet achieves true
autonomy, and Han and Tibetans get along with each other in harmony.
From the beginning of the 1960s, the Tibetan government-in-exile in Dharamasala, India started to
experiment at building a system of democratic government. In his Strasbourg Proposal, the Dalai
Lama said that "The Tibetan government should be composed of an independent administration and
legislature chosen by the vote of all citizens and a court system." The Dalai Lama even proposed
changing the Tibetan form of government that combines politics and religion. He didn't worry if he
might become the "last Dalai" in Tibetan history.10 Tibetans have already made preparations for a
democratic political system. Shouldn't the central government in Beijing make similar preparations?
Certainly for the Chinese Communist decision-makers who know hold power, changing the present
system and creating a new institutional framework would take a great deal of courage and wisdom.
This would not be just for Tibet or for Taiwan; it would be for all the 1.3 billion citizens of the People's
Republic of China. To be honest, even after China has established a constitutional form of government,
finding the reasonable sharing of jurisdiction between the central government and the nationalities
areas will not be easy.
I once wrote an article entitled "Two Track Republican System: A Proposal for the Reform of the
Chinese System of Constitutional Government". In this article I pointed out that it is an uncontested
fact that the "division of powers" and "autonomy" strengthen the rights consciousness of citizens and
increases their participation in public affairs (in the nationalities areas, autonomy also helps preserve
the cultural traditions of nationalities and protects their special interests). Yet these is another aspect to
this problem, that is the tendency of interests to expand and the "logic of collective interests". The
latter will certainly create some "problems of the commons" which will have to be solved by the
intervention of a public power at a higher level that is above local interests, especially intervention by
the central government.
Returning to the present, there is still a chance for the central government to solve the Tibet issue. That
can be done by conducting genuine negotiations with the Dalai Lama. Recently Beijing has already
said that it is willing to resume contact. That is good. Even if it is just a pose, it is positive. Everyone
hopes that the takes can produce genuine results so as to create a harmonious bridge between the Han
and Tibetan peoples while the Dalai Lama is still alive. If this issue is not handled well, then "splitting"
might become a real and present danger.
As a Chinese citizen, I naturally don't want to see Tibet split off from the household of our motherland.
We should believe that the trend of human civilization is towards unifying rather than towards splitting.
Unity is helpful for solving many of the problems that humanity is faced with. As a Chinese proverb
goes, the melon that is grabbed roughly cannot be sweet -- unity needs to be a voluntary unity based
upon a community of interests. Forced compliance cannot produce good results. This simple truth can
also be applied to politics.
(This article was written April 22 - 28, 2008 in Beijing)

Posted by google at 03:06 PM | Comments (0)

May 09, 2008

Views On China's Torch Relay Split

Was China's Olympic-torch relay around the world a miserable failure or a surprising success?

Yes.

To observers in the U.S. and Europe, Beijing's international spectacle was a public-relations disaster as protesters in both those regions tried to snatch or snuff the torch. Outside China, the relay seemed to symbolize the divisiveness of issues such as China's treatment of its Tibetan population. At home, it represented a profound sense of national unity.

'I am really excited that the torch has come home,' says Laura Yang, a 24-year old consultant from Shanghai. 'The torch relay has been a good patriotic education for people in this country.'

Beijing's slogan for the Olympics ('One World One Dream') belies the disparate perspectives on China, which are so conflicting that it's 'like watching the world's biggest, slowest traffic accident,' writes China-based blogger Dave Lyons, a 30-year-old American who coined the term 'SchizOlympics.' When it comes to contentious issues such as human rights, he says, China and the West live in 'two completely separate parallel worlds.'

Among the vast majority of China's population, there is no regret at having promoted a public display that attracted so much opposition. Sponsors of the torch paid an estimated $60 million to ship it around the world. So when the torch, called a 'sacred flame' in China, reached the mainland on Sunday, it was greeted by tens of thousands of adoring fans -- many with their faces painted with the Chinese flag and Olympic rings. On Thursday, the flame made it through Tibet to top Everest, as one climber shouted 'Long live Beijing!'

That nationalism sharply contrasts with U.S. sentiment towards the superpower. Seven out of 10 Americans felt Beijing shouldn't have been awarded the Games because of its human-rights abuses, according to an April survey conducted by Zogby International during the torch's tour. In England, aspects of the torch relay prompted an outcry from people like Sebastian Coe, the head of London's Olympics Organizing Committee, who referred to the Chinese guards in blue track suits that have accompanied the flame around the world as 'thugs.'

In China, however, the same scene looked heroic, if not sexy. Women have treated one of the guards, known only as Second Right Brother (referring to where he always stands in relation to the flame) as a handsome hero who stands up to protect national pride in the face of adversity. He has already received a marriage proposal from one eager Chinese fan.

When Chinese people started watching online video clips of protesters in the West targeting the torch, they were taken by surprise and responded to the attacks in a extremely personal way. Criticism abroad unified patriotism at home.

'The torch relay showed the power of Chinese people,' says Douglas Zhang, a 24-year-old online editor in Beijing. He was deeply moved, he says, watching 'Chinese people from all over the world get together and voluntarily protect the torch.'

And carry it -- sort of. Some 40 million users of one instant-messaging service switched their icons to torches when the real torch touched ground in mainland China last Sunday, volunteering to become 'virtual torch-bearers.'

It's possible that 'the audience for the international torch relay was not really international -- it was domestic,' says David Wolf, a Beijing-based communications consultant. 'This is really more about getting Chinese to feel good about China.'

China's 1.3 billion people are by no means always this unified. Corruption and a growing divide between rich and poor have led to thousands of protests each year and considerable efforts by a government focused on 'maintaining stability' to redirect energy elsewhere.

Nationalism is a remarkably effective way, though its biggest drawback is a tendency to get out of control. A few zealous patriots have sent death threats to perceived traitors, and some called for a boycott of French supermarket chain Carrefour SA, staging protests outside its Chinese outlets. The government has already worked to rein in some of this more extreme sentiment, even as it has encouraged criticism in the domestic media against foreign coverage of China.

If the torch symbolically flamed out in the U.S. and Europe, it didn't for far-larger audiences elsewhere, say public-relations and branding experts. Jonathan Chajet, the China general manager of Omnicom Group Inc.'s Interbrand agency, says, 'China's potential market is also three billion people in Africa, India and China.'

A market that size has a way of distracting corporate sponsors. Coca-Cola Co., a relay and top-level Games sponsor, threw a giant party when the torch landed in Hainan featuring pop-music performances, and it unveiled a TV commercial featuring a giant red carpet for the torch being rolled out from the top of Mount Everest.

'Being a sponsor is good for Coke around the world -- but the importance this time is making Coke look good in China,' says Russ Meyer, the San Francisco-based chief strategy officer of WPP Group PLC's branding agency Landor Associates. 'The internal benefit plays a larger role than in past Games.'

Beijing's Games themselves may yet surprise detractors and impress everyone, say longtime Olympics watchers, noting that there's almost always controversy before the Games start. If anything, the torch controversy may have helpfully lowered expectations.

'The best thing to do is to walk into this situation with people thinking it's a failure,' says Mr. Wolf, the consultant. 'Then you can't lose.'

Geoffrey A. Fowler

http://chinese.wsj.com/gb/20080509/fea175416.asp?source=email

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May 08, 2008

Mind Science

http://www.hd.net/drr313.html

Posted by google at 10:07 PM | Comments (0)

May 07, 2008

Tibet: What We Know and What We Still Need To Know

Michigan China Fellows

Present

The 7th MCF Annual Forum

Tibet: What We Know and What We Still Need To Know

Saturday, May 10th, 2008

Great Lake Rooms (4 floor, North and Central), Palmer Commons (100 Washtenaw Avenue)

Map and Direction: http://www.umich.edu/~palmcomm/mapsAndDirections/index.html

Parking: http://www.umich.edu/~palmcomm/parking/index.html

Presentations and Discussion will be conducted in Chinese.

Dinner will be provided

1:00 – 1:25pm Introduction and Ground Rules

1:30 – 1:55pm Tibet in International Relations

Zhou Fang, One Country Two Systems Research Institute (Hong Kong)

1:55 – 2:20pm Tibet's History

Hailing Cheng, Physics

2:20 – 2:45pm Today's Tibet

Dandan Jian, Public Policy

2:45 – 3:00pm Coffee Break

3:00 – 3:25pm The Local Action of Ann Arbor

Jinhui Chen, Chemistry

3:25 – 3:50pm The Myth of Nationalism

Lei Zhong, Philosophy

3:50 – 4:15pm New Politics of Globalization

Yan Long, Women's Studies and Sociology

4:15 – 4:30 pm Tibetan Buddhism

Taiyan Ye, Ann Arbor Buddhist Society

4:30-5:30 pm Open Discussion

5: 30pm-- Dinner

Questions? Please contact Hailing Cheng at hailingc@umich.edu.

Any opinions, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed on the forum are those of the presenter(s) and do not reflect or represent the views of MCF and its members other than the presenter.

Michigan China Forum 2008 is organized by Michigan China Fellows with financial support from LSA Student Government & Center for Chinese Study (CCS) at University of Michigan

-----------------------------------

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May 06, 2008

Tibet Envoys Knock China But Vow To Continue Talks

Two envoys of the Dalai Lama, in meetings with Chinese officials, criticized Beijing's handling of unrest in Tibet and asked China to prove its assertions that the Tibetan spiritual leader orchestrated violent anti-Chinese protests, a senior leader of Tibet's government-in-exile said Monday.

Still, the Tibetan envoys and Chinese officials, who met in Shenzhen on Sunday, agreed to restart talks that halted in mid-2007 on the future of Tibet, according to Samdhong Rinpoche, chairman of the exiled government's Kashag, or cabinet.

Prof. Rinpoche's remarks, made in an interview with The Wall Street Journal, were the first official Tibetan comment on the Shenzhen meetings.

An earlier round of talks between Chinese and Tibetan officials was suspended last summer after failing to bridge deep differences. But fallout from March's anti-Chinese protests in Tibet and a harsh security crackdown that ensued appear to have pushed Beijing and Tibet's government-in-exile to meet again.

'Both sides explained their differences,' said Prof. Rinpoche. 'The process of dialogue will continue.'

The Chinese side was represented by Zhu Weiqun and Sitar, both vice ministers of the United Front Work Department of the Communist Party, a top policy-making body on religious and ethnic relations for China's ruling party.

According to China's official Xinhua news agency, Messrs. Zhu and Sitar told the Tibetan envoys the Lhasa riots had 'given rise to new obstacles for resuming contacts and consultations.'

Still, sending such high-ranking officials to Sunday's meeting shows Beijing's seriousness, said Li Hongbin, a professor in the history department at the Central University for Nationalities. 'I personally am optimistic, but I believe that one or two meetings can't resolve all the differences built up over the decades,' he said.

It's not clear when a new round of discussions with China over Tibet might resume. Sunday's agreement represents a small victory for the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan government-in-exile, which had previously pushed for resumption of talks with little success. But resuming the suspended talks is also useful to Beijing, as it tries to deflect criticism of its Tibet crackdown ahead of the Olympics. While agreeing to new talks without conceding anything to the Dalai Lama's envoys, China can still continue its media campaign against Tibetan dissident groups.

The envoys who represented Tibet in Shenzhen -- Lodi Gyaltsen Gyari, based in Washington, and Kelsang Gyaltsen, based in Zurich -- were heading to Dharmsala Monday to brief the government-in-exile on details of Sunday's discussion, according to Prof. Rinpoche.

In his political role, the rough equivalent of a prime minister, Prof. Rinpoche heads a Tibetan-government task force on the dialogue with China.

The unrest in Tibet has embarrassed China internationally and has complicated Beijing's efforts to present to the world a more open image as it prepares to host the Summer Olympics and showcase its racing economy.

Since the March turmoil, China has severely restricted travel to Tibet, especially for foreign tourists and media. Chinese officials and state-backed media have bitterly criticized the Dalai Lama for allegedly orchestrating the protests, angering legions of his followers. Partly as a result, anti-Chinese protests have dogged the global relay of the Olympic torch bound for the Beijing games.

The Tibet-related violence inside China has claimed lives of both Tibetans and Chinese, though estimates of the numbers of deaths vary widely. Beijing says 22 people, mostly ethnic Han Chinese, have died in the unrest. Tibetan exile groups say about 200 people were killed. There has been no independent confirmation of the death toll.

The protests in Tibet marked the anniversary of a crackdown on Tibetan political dissenters in March 1959. During that period, the Dalai Lama escaped to India, followed by thousands of refugees. He eventually settled in the north Indian hill town of Dharmsala, where the government-in-exile is now headquartered and where a younger generation of Tibetans has massed in support for full independence from China.

In the interview, Prof. Rinpoche, who was still awaiting a full briefing of Sunday's Shenzhen meetings, said the two Tibetan envoys demanded that Chinese security forces halt arbitrary arrests, release political prisoners and compensate families of people killed in the protests.

He also said the envoys asked the Chinese to stop accusing the Dalai Lama of stirring up violence 'or else share the proof with the international community.'

Despite the pointed criticism, Prof. Rinpoche described the atmosphere at the meetings as good because the Tibetan envoys were given the opportunity to air their grievances. 'They were able to say what they wanted to say,' he noted.

Although it was the first meeting since the most recent unrest, the two Tibetan envoys are familiar figures in China. They spearheaded six rounds of talks over the future of Tibet, held between 2002 and 2007.

But after those talks broke off without any clear progress, members of the Tibetan negotiating team came in for criticism among frustrated exiles who believe the Chinese leadership is dragging its feet, waiting for the Dalai Lama to die and hoping the independence movement fragments without him.

'The reality is the Chinese are playing for time and we are playing into their hands,' said Lhasang Tsering, a former government official who now runs a bookshop with his wife in Dharmsala. 'We already know we can't have 'meaningful' talks with the Chinese.'

U.S. and European leaders have urged China to engage in dialogue with envoys of the Dalai Lama. The Buddhist leader -- who won the Nobel Peace prize in 1989 -- has advocated to Beijing a 'Middle Way' that accepts Chinese sovereignty over Tibet in exchange for more autonomy among Tibetans living inside China.

Prof. Rinpoche, who is also a high-ranking Buddhist monk, said there's been no rethinking the Dalai Lama's approach, despite the lack of headway in dialogue.

'If we remain without contact, what result can be achieved?' he asked. Those who advocate not engaging with the Chinese, he added, don't have much to show for their stand either. Prof. Rinpoche, dressed in crimson and mustard robes, is the first head of Tibet's government-in-exile to be voted into office in an election. He's serving the second of two terms. The Dalai Lama remains Tibet's spiritual leader and also the head of state, but has ceded much day-to-day management of government affairs to Prof. Rinpoche.

Prof. Rinpoche rejected any suggestion that Tibet's struggle for more autonomy in China would die with the Dalai Lama. 'A new generation will carry on the struggle,' he said. Besides, the 72-year-old Dalai Lama is in 'very good health,' added Prof. Rinpoche. 'He can work another twenty years.'

Peter Wonacott

http://chinese.wsj.com/gb/20080506/bch115759.asp?source=email

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May 01, 2008

One Man vs. China

http://www.hd.net/drr234.html

Posted by google at 11:03 AM | Comments (0)

Chinese Students in U.S. Fight View of Their Home

April 29, 2008

By SHAILA DEWAN
Correction Appended

LOS ANGELES — When the time came for the smiling Tibetan monk at the front of the University of Southern California lecture hall to answer questions, the Chinese students who packed the audience for the talk last Tuesday had plenty to lob at their guest:

If Tibet was not part of China, why had the Chinese emperor been the one to give the Dalai Lama his title? How did the tenets of Buddhism jibe with the “slavery system” in Tibet before China’s modernization efforts? What about the Dalai Lama’s connection to Hitler?

As the monk tried to rebut the students, they grew more hostile. They brandished photographs and statistics to support their claims. “Stop lying! Stop lying!” one young man said. A plastic bottle of water hit the wall behind the monk, and campus police officers hustled the person who threw it out of the room.

Scenes like this, ranging from civil to aggressive, have played out at colleges across the country over the past month, as Chinese students in the United States have been forced to confront an image of their homeland that they neither recognize nor appreciate. Since the riots last month in Tibet, the disrupted Olympic torch relays and calls to boycott the opening ceremony of the Games in Beijing, Chinese students, traditionally silent on political issues, have begun to lash out at what they perceive as a pervasive anti-Chinese bias.

Last year, there were more than 42,000 students from mainland China studying in the United States, an increase from fewer than 20,000 in 2003, according to the State Department.

Campuses including Cornell, the University of Washington in Seattle and the University of California, Irvine, have seen a wave of counterdemonstrations using tactics that seem jarring in the American academic context. At the University of Washington, students fought to limit the Dalai Lama’s address to nonpolitical topics. At Duke, pro-China students surrounded and drowned out a pro-Tibet vigil; a Chinese freshman who tried to mediate received death threats, and her family was forced into hiding.

And last Saturday, students from as far as Florida and Tennessee traveled to Atlanta to picket CNN after a commentator, Jack Cafferty, referred to the Chinese as “goons and thugs.” (CNN said he was referring to the government, not the people.)

The student anger, stoked through e-mail messages sent to large campus mailing lists, stems not so much from satisfaction with the Chinese government but from shock at the portrayal of its actions, as well as frustration over the West’s long-standing love affair with Tibet — a love these students see as willfully blind.

By and large, they do not acknowledge the cultural and religious crackdown in Tibet, insisting that ordinary Tibetans have prospered under China’s economic development, and that only a small minority are unhappy.

“Before I came here, I’m very liberal,” said Minna Jia, a graduate student in political science at U.S.C. who encouraged fellow students to attend the monk’s lecture. “But after I come here, my professor told me that I’m nationalist.”

“I believe in democracy,” Ms. Jia added, “but I can’t stand for someone to criticize my country using biased ways. You are wearing Chinese clothes and you are using Chinese goods.”

Students interviewed for this article deplored the more extreme expressions of anger, like death threats against the Duke freshman and the tossing of the water bottle, and pointed out that Chinese students had little experience in the art of protest. But, they said, they could also understand them.

“We’ve been smothered for too long time,” said Jasmine Dong, another graduate student who attended the U.S.C. lecture.

By that, Ms. Dong did not mean that Chinese students had been repressed or censored by their own government. She meant that the Western news media had not acknowledged the strides China had made or the voices of overseas Chinese. “We are still neglected or misunderstood as either brainwashed or manipulated by the government,” she said.

No matter what China does, these students say, it cannot win in the arena of world opinion. “When we have a billion people, you said we were destroying the planet./ When we tried limiting our numbers, you said it is human rights abuse,” reads a poem posted on the Internet by “a silent, silent Chinese” and cited by some students as an accurate expression of their feelings. “When we were poor, you thought we were dogs./ When we loan you cash, you blame us for your debts./ When we build our industries, you called us polluters./ When we sell you goods, you blame us for global warming.”

Rather than blend in to the prevailing campus ethos of free debate, the more strident Chinese students seem to replicate the authoritarian framework of their homeland, photographing demonstration participants and sometimes drowning out dissent.

A Tibetan student who declined to be identified for fear of harassment said he decided not to attend a vigil for Tibet on his campus, which he also did not want identified because there are so few Tibetans there. “It’s not that I didn’t want to, I really did want to go — it’s our cause,” he said. “At the same time, I have to consider that my family’s back there, and I’m going back there in May.”

Another factor fueling the zeal of many Chinese demonstrators could be that they, too, intend to return home; the Chinese government is widely believed to be monitoring large e-mail lists.

Universities have often tried to accommodate the anger of their Chinese students. Before the Dalai Lama’s visit to the University of Washington, the campus Chinese Students and Scholars Association wrote to the university president expressing hopes that the visit would focus only on nonpolitical issues and not arouse anti-China sentiments. According to a posting on the group’s Web site, the university president, Mark A. Emmert, told them in a meeting that no political questions would be raised at the Dalai Lama’s speech. A spokesman said the university, which opened an office in Beijing last fall, had prescreened student questions before the Chinese students voiced their concerns.

Some experts say that colleges feel constrained from reining in the more extreme protests through a combination of concerns about cultural sensitivity and a desire to expand their own ties with China.

“I think there tends to be a great deal of self-censorship,” said Peter Gries, director of the Institute for U.S.-China Issues at the University of Oklahoma, “and not just among American China scholars but among the whole web of people who do business with China, including school administrators.”

At the U.S.C. lecture, the Chinese students arrived early to distribute handouts on Tibet and China that contained a jumble of abbreviated history, slogans and maps with little context. A chart showing that infant mortality in Tibet had plummeted since 1951, when the Communist Chinese government asserted control, did not provide any means for comparison with mortality rates in China or other countries.

One photograph showed the Dalai Lama with Heinrich Harrer, author of “Seven Years in Tibet” and a one-time member of the Nazi Party — hence the question about the Dalai Lama’s connection to Hitler, who died when the Dalai Lama was nine. The question about slavery referred to the feudal system in place in Tibet until the mid-20th century. Another photograph purported to show a Tibetan drum that, according to the caption, was covered with “a virgin girl’s skin.”

The students said they were frustrated by a sense that many accounts of the recent riots did not reflect the violence and destruction by the Tibetan protesters, who vandalized shops owned by Han Chinese (the ethnic majority in China). According to official Chinese news sources, 22 died in the rioting.

Much of the anger has the tenor of disillusionment. During the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989, the Western news media was seen as a source of otherwise elusive truth.

“We thought Western media is very objective,” said Chao Wu, a 28-year-old working on his doctorate in material science, “and what it turned out is that Western media is even more biased than Chinese media. They’re no better, and even more, they’re against us.”

Students argue that China has spent billions on Tibet, building schools, roads and other infrastructure. Asked if the Tibetans wanted such development, they looked blankly incredulous. “They don’t ask that question,” said Lionel Jensen, a China scholar at Notre Dame. “They’ve accepted the basic premise of aggressive modernization.”

That may be, some experts suggest, because the students whose families can afford to send them abroad are the ones who have benefited the most from China’s economic liberalization.

Spring Zheng, 27, another graduate student at U.S.C., dismissed the notion that her patriotism stemmed from the government’s efforts to use the schools to instill national pride, particularly after Tiananmen Square.

Rather, Ms. Zheng said, “We have witnessed with our own eyes about the rapid change of China. China is developing fast, and Chinese people’s lives” are “becoming better and better, fast.”

As the U.S.C. session wound to a close, the organizer, Lisa Leeman, a documentary film instructor, pleaded for a change in tone. “My hope for this event, which I don’t totally see happening here, is for people on both, quote, sides to really hear each other and maybe learn from each other,” Ms. Leeman said. “Are there any genuine questions that don’t stem from a political point of view, that are really not here to be on a soap box?”

At that moment, the bottle hit the wall.

Michael Anti contributed reporting from Cambridge, Mass.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: May 1, 2008
An article on Tuesday about Chinese students in the United States who have to deal with negative images of their home country misspelled the family name of a doctoral student at the University of Southern California who said the Western news media were biased against China. And a correction in this space on Wednesday gave another incorrect spelling. He is Chao Wu — not Chou Wu or Chau Wu.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/29/education/29student.html?_r=1&sq=chinese%20students&st=nyt&scp=1&pagewanted=print

Posted by google at 11:00 AM | Comments (0)

Tibet Crisis

presented by China News Club, University of Michigan

May 24, 2008

Tibetans offer Solace to China Quake Victims through Prayers

Dalai Lama In Germany, "Sad" About China Quake

Dalai Lama offers help to the Chinese

May 18, 2008

Fed Up With Peace

May 11, 2008

http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2004/08/the-words-you-never-see-in-chinese-cyberspace/

Kong Lingxi: A Chinese Student’s Interview With the Dalai Lama

Zhang Boshu: The Way to Resolve the Tibet Issue

May 09, 2008

Views On China's Torch Relay Split

May 08, 2008

Mind Science

May 07, 2008

Tibet: What We Know and What We Still Need To Know

May 06, 2008

Tibet Envoys Knock China But Vow To Continue Talks

May 01, 2008

One Man vs. China

Chinese Students in U.S. Fight View of Their Home