Tibet Crisis

The International Olympic Committee chastised China for comments made by Mr. Zhang when the Olympic torch passed through Lhasa last month, which the IOC said were improperly politicizing the Games that are to start in Beijing on Aug. 8.

Representatives of the Dalai Lama arrived in Beijing Monday for what the self-proclaimed Tibet government-in-exile said would be two days of talks. China, which confirmed talks were taking place, would say nothing about their duration or agenda.

Neither side commented Wednesday on the substance of the talks. A statement issued by the Dalai Lama's office before the start of the discussions called for 'tangible progress to alleviate the difficult situation for Tibetans in their homeland.'

Some world leaders have said they are considering boycotting the Olympic opening ceremonies to protest China's crackdown on Tibetan demonstrators. French President Nicholas Sarkozy said this week he would attend if the current talks make progress.

China's foreign-ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao responded on Tuesday by saying 'the Tibet issue is China's internal affair' and that China opposes 'connecting Tibet-related issues with the Beijing Olympics.'

China's president, Hu Jintao, has made building a 'harmonious society' the guiding philosophy of his administration. And the government's focus on blaming the Dalai Lama for Tibetan unrest is coupled with an extreme reluctance to acknowledge the underlying economic, ethnic and other tensions in Tibetan areas and elsewhere.

Party officials, for example, blamed large-scale violent protests -- during which about 30,000 people took to the streets in a southwestern Chinese city in Guizhou province last weekend -- on 'very few people with ulterior motives,' according to a report by China's state-run Xinhua news agency.

The demonstrations began as a call for a new investigation into the death of a teenager who some believe was raped and murdered by people with official connections. Twenty police officers and 30 protesters were injured in the rioting and the county Communist Party Committee building was set on fire, as were 20 police vehicles.

Many Tibetans say they face limits on their religious practices and freedom of expression and feel they are being left out of the economic boom that has been enriching the eastern China heartland of the country's Han Chinese majority.

Tibet remains one of the poorest parts of China, and some government economic-development plans -- such as efforts to shift nomadic herders into more settled livelihoods -- also have caused resentment among Tibetans.

Even before the mid-March riots in Lhasa -- in which crowds of Tibetans attacked Han Chinese and Muslim Hui -- communal tensions were running high in parts of western China with large Tibetan populations.

In the town of Tongren on the eastern edge of the Tibetan plateau in Qinghai province, for example, Tibetan, Han and Hui residents clashed in late February during Tibetan and Han Chinese festivals after the Lunar New Year. Local residents say a dispute between a Hui balloon vendor and some Tibetans turned into a riot.

'That day was like a volcanic explosion,' says one Tibetan man. 'The violence got more and more serious as more and more people got involved.' The Tibetan anger was fueled by 'resentment,' the man said -- of Tibetans' treatment by the government and what was viewed as Han infringement on a Tibetan celebration.

After the demonstrations in Lhasa, Buddhist monks from the local monastery joined by lay people participated in more marches and protests. Police moved in reinforcements, and the unrest lately has been halted by arrests and surveillance, local residents say.

Gordon Fairclough