April 14, 2008
Tibetan People's Uprising Movement
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDoEHW75FCM
Posted by google at 12:37 AM | Comments (0)
April 08, 2008
Torch by radical Tibetan Youth Congress
Posted by google at 07:33 AM | Comments (0)
April 06, 2008
Protests in Tibet and Separatism: the Olympics and Beyond
Barry Sautman
Recent protests in Lhasa and other Tibetan areas were organized to embarrass
the Chinese government ahead of the Olympics. The Tibetan Youth Congress (
TYC), the major Tibetan exile organization that advocates independence for
Tibet and has endorsed using violent methods to achieve it, has said as much
. Its head, Tsewang Rigzin, stated in a March 15 interview with the Chicago
Tribune that since it is likely that Chinese authorities would suppress
protests in Tibet, “With the spotlight on them with the Olympics, we want
to test them. We want them to show their true colors. That’s why we’re
pushing this.” At the June, 2007 Conference for an Independent Tibet
organized in India by “Friends of Tibet,” speakers pointed out that the
Olympics present a unique opportunity for protests in Tibet. In January,
2008, exiles in India launched a “Tibetan People’s Uprising Movement” to
“act in the spirit” of the violent 1959 uprising against Chinese
government authority and focus on the Olympics.
Several groups of Tibetans were likely involved in the protests in Lhasa,
including in the burning and looting of non-Tibetan businesses and attacks
against Han and Hui (Muslim Chinese) migrants to Tibet. The large
monasteries have long been centers of separatism, a stance cultivated by the
TYC and other exile entities, many of which are financed by the US State
Department or the US Congress’ National Endowment for Democracy. Monks are
self-selected to be especially devoted to the Dalai Lama. However much he
may characterize his own position as seeking only greater autonomy for Tibet
, monks know he is unwilling to declare that Tibet is an inalienable part of
China, an act China demands of him as a precondition to formal negotiations
. Because the exile regime eschews a separation of politics and religion,
many monks deem adherence to the Dalai Lama’s stance of non-recognition of
the Chinese government’s legitimacy in Tibet to be a religious obligation.
Reports on the violence have underscored that Tibetan merchants competing
with Han and Hui are especially antagonistic to the presence of non-Tibetans
. Alongside monks, Tibetan merchants were the mainstay of protests in Lhasa
in the late 1980s and early 1990s. This time around, many Han and Hui-owned
shops were torched. Many of those involved in arson, looting, and ethnic-
based beatings are also likely to have been unemployed young men. Towns have
experienced much rural-to-urban migration of Tibetans with few skills
needed for urban employment. Videos from Lhasa showed the vast majority of
rioters were males in their teens or twenties.
The recent actions in Tibetan areas differ from the broad-based
demonstrations of “people power” movements in several parts of the world
in the last few decades. They hardly show the overwhelming Tibetan anti-
Chinese consensus portrayed in the international media. The highest media
estimate of Tibetans who participated in protests is 20,000 — by Steve Chao
, the Beijing Bureau Chief of Canadian Television News, i.e. one of every
300 Tibetans. Compare that to the 1986 protests against the Marcos
dictatorship by about three million — one out of every 19 Filipinos.
Tibetans have legitimate grievances about not being sufficiently helped to
compete for jobs and in business with migrants to Tibet. There is also job
discrimination by Han migrants in favor of family members and people from
their native places. The gaps in education and living standards between
Tibetans and Han are substantial and too slow in narrowing. The grievances
have long existed, but protests and rioting took place this year because the
Olympics make it opportune for separatists to advance their agenda. Indeed,
there was a radical disconnect between Tibetan socio-economic grievances
and the slogans raised in the protests, such as “Complete Independence for
Tibet” and “May the exiles and Tibetans inside Tibet be reunited,”
slogans that not coincidentally replicate those raised by pro-independence
Tibetan exiles.
While separatists will not succeed in detaching Tibet from China by rioting,
they believe that China will eventually collapse, like the former Soviet
Union and Yugoslavia, and they seek to establish their claim to rule before
that happens. Alternatively, they think that the United States may intervene
, as it has elsewhere, to foster the breakaway of regions in countries to
which the US is antagonistic, e.g. Kosovo and southern Sudan. The Chinese
government also fears such eventualities, however unlikely they are to come
to pass. It accordingly acts to suppress separatism, an action that comports
with its rights under international law.
Separatists know they can count on the automatic sympathy of Western
politicians and media, who view China as a strategic economic and political
competitor. Western elites have thus widely condemned China for suppressing
riots that these elites would never allow to go unsuppressed in their own
countries. They demand that China be restrained in its response; yet, during
the Los Angeles uprising or riots of 1992 — which spread to a score of
other major cities — President George H.W. Bush stated when he sent in
thousands of soldiers, that “There can be no excuse for the murder, arson,
theft or vandalism that have terrorized the people of Los Angeles . . . Let
me assure you that I will use whatever force is necessary to restore order.
” Neither Western politicians nor mainstream media attacked him on this
score, while neither Western leaders nor the Dalai Lama have criticized
those Tibetans who recently engaged in ethnic-based attacks and arson.
Western elites give the Chinese government no recognition for significant
improvements in the lives of Tibetans as a result of subsidies from the
China’s central government and provinces, improvements that the Dalai Lama
has himself admitted. Western politicians and media also consistently credit
the Dalai Lama’s charge that “cultural genocide” is underway in Tibet,
even though the exiles and their supporters offer no credible evidence of
the evisceration of Tibetan language use, religious practice or art. In fact
, more than 90% of Tibetans speak Tibetan as their mother tongue. Tibet has
about 150,000 monks and nuns, the highest concentration of full-time “
clergy” in the Buddhist world. Western scholars of Tibetan literature and
art forms have attested that it is flourishing.
Ethnic contradictions in Tibet arise from the demography, economy and
politics of the Tibetan areas. Separatists and their supporters claim that
Han Chinese have been “flooding” into Tibet, “swamping” Tibetans
demographically. In fact, between the national censuses of 1990 and 2000 (
which count everyone who has lived in an area for six months or more), the
percentage of Tibetans in the Tibetan areas as a whole increased somewhat
and Han were about one-fifth of the population. A preliminary analysis of
the 2005 mini-census shows that from 2000-2005 there was a small increase in
the proportion of Han in the central-western parts of Tibet (the Tibet
Autonomous Region or TAR) and little change in eastern Tibet. Pro-
independence forces want the Tibetan areas cleansed of Han (as happened in
1912 and 1949); the Dalai Lama has said he will accept a three-to-one
Tibetan to non-Tibet population ratio, but he consistently misrepresents the
present situation as one of a Han majority. Given his status as not merely
the top Tibetan Buddhist religious leader, but as an emanation of Buddha,
most Tibetans credit whatever he says on this or other topics.
The Tibetan countryside, where three-fourths of the population lives, has
very few non-Tibetans. The vast majority of Han migrants to Tibetan towns
are poor or near-poor. They are not personally subsidized by the state;
although like urban Tibetans, they are indirectly subsidized by
infrastructure development that favors the towns. Some 85% of Han who
migrate to Tibet to establish businesses fail; they generally leave within
two to three years. Those who survive economically offer competition to
local Tibetan business people, but a comprehensive study in Lhasa has shown
that non-Tibetans have pioneered small and medium enterprise sectors that
some Tibetans have later entered and made use of their local knowledge to
prosper.
Tibetans are not simply an underclass; there is a substantial Tibetan middle
class, based in government service, tourism, commerce, and small-scale
manufacturing/ transportation. There are also many unemployed or under-
employed Tibetans, but almost no unemployed or underemployed Han because
those who cannot find work leave. Many Han migrants have racist attitudes
toward Tibetans, mostly notions that Tibetans are lazy, dirty, and obsessed
with religion. Many Tibetans reciprocate with representations of Han as rich
, money-obsessed and conspiring to exploit Tibetans. Long-resident urban
Tibetans absorb aspects of Han culture in much the same way that ethnic
minorities do with ethnic majority cultures the world over. Tibetans are not
however being forcibly “Sincized.” Most Tibetans speak little or no
Chinese. They begin to learn it in the higher primary grades and, in many
Tibetan areas, must study in it if they go on to secondary education.
Chinese, however, is one of the two most important languages in the world
and considerable advantages accrue to those who learn it, just as they do to
non-native English speakers.
The Tibetan exiles argue that religious practice is sharply restricted in
Tibetan areas. The Chinese government has the right under international law
to regulate religious institutions to prevent them from being used as
vehicles for separatism and the control of religion is in fact mostly a
function of the state’s (overly-developed) concern about separatism and
secondarily about how the hyper-development of religious institutions
counteracts “development” among ethnic Tibetans. Certain state policies do
infringe on freedom of religion; for example, the forbidding, in the TAR (
Tibet Autonomous Region), of state employees and university students to
participate in religious rites. The lesser degree of control over religion
in the eastern Tibetan areas beyond the TAR– at least before the events of
March, 2008 — indicate however that the Chinese government calibrates its
control according to the perceived degree of separatist sentiment in the
monasteries.
The Dalai Lama’s regime was of course itself a theocracy that closely
regulated the monasteries, including the politics, hierarchy and number of
monks. The exile authorities today circumscribe by fiat those religious
practices they oppose, such as the propitiation of a “deity” known as
Dorje Shugden. The cult of the Dalai Lama, which is even stronger among
monks than it is among Hollywood stars, nevertheless mandates acceptance of
his claim that restrictions on religious management and practice in Tibet
arise solely from the Chinese state’s supposed anti-religious animus.
Similarly, the cult requires the conviction that the Dalai Lama is a
pacifist, even though he has explicitly or implicitly endorsed all wars
waged by the US.
The Dalai Lama is a Tibetan ethnic nationalist whose worldview is — in US
terms — both liberal and conservative. He and many of his foreign
supporters have a pronounced affinity for conservative politicians, such as
Bush, Thatcher, Lee Teng-hui and Ishihara Shintaro, but they can get along
well with liberals like US Speaker Nancy Pelosi, because they are virulently
anti-communist and anti-China.
The Dalai Lama is far from being a supporter of oppressed peoples. For
example, in 2002, when he visited Australia, the Dalai Lama, upon arriving
in Melbourne, noted “he had flown over ‘a large empty area’ of Australia
that could house millions of people from other densely populated continents.
” The area is, of course, not wholly empty, as it contains Aborigines. To
them, the Dalai Lama proffered the advice that “black people ‘should
appreciate what white people have brought to this country, its development.
’” (R. Callick, “Dalai Lama Treads Fine Line,” Australian Financial
Review, May 22, 2002).
The development of the “market economy” has had much the same effect in
Tibetan areas as in the rest of China, i.e. increased exploitation,
exacerbated income and wealth differentials, and rampant corruption. The
degree to which this involves an “ethnic division of labor” that
disadvantages Tibetans is however exaggerated by separatists in order to
foster ethnic antagonism. For example, Tibet is not the poorest area of
China, as is often claimed. It is better off than several other ethnic
minority areas and even than some Han areas, in large measure due to heavy
government subsidies. Rural Tibetans as well receive more state subsidies
than other minorities. The exile leaders employ hyperbole not only in terms
of the degree of empirical difference, but also concerning the more
fundamental ethnic relationship in Tibet: in contrast to, say, Israel/
Palestine, Tibetans have the same rights as Han, they enjoy certain
preferential economic and social policies, and about half the top party
leaders in the TAR have been ethnic Tibetans.
Tibet has none of the indicia of a colony or occupied territory and thus has
no relationship to self-determination, a concept that in recent decades has
often been misused, especially by the US, to foster the breakup of states
and consequent emiseration of their populations. A settlement between the
Chinese government and Tibetan exile elites is a pre-condition for the
mitigation of Tibetan grievances because absent a settlement, ethnic
politics will continue to subsume every issue in Tibet, as it does for
example, in Taiwan and Kosovo, where ethnic binaries are constructed by “
ethnic political entrepreneurs,” who seek to outbid each other for support.
The protests in Tibet had no progressive aspect. Many who participated in
the ethnic murders, beatings and arsons in Lhasa were poor rural migrants to
the city, but the slogans there and elsewhere in Tibet almost all concerned
independence or the Dalai Lama. There have been many movements the world
over in which marginalized people have taken a reactionary and often racist
road, for example, al-Qaeda or much of the base of the Nazis. The riots in
Tibet also have done nothing to advance discussions of a political
settlement between the Chinese government and exiles, yet a settlement is
necessary for the substantial mitigation of Tibetan grievances. For Tibetan
pro-independence forces, a setback to such efforts may have been their very
purpose in fostering the riots. Tibetan pro-independence forces, like
separatists everywhere, seek to counter any view of the world that is not
ethnic-based and to thwart all efforts to resolve ethnic contradictions, in
order to boost the mobilization needed to sustain their ethnic nationalist
projects. They have claimed that China will soon collapse and the US will
thereafter increase its patronage of a Tibetan state elite, to the benefit
of ordinary Tibetans. One only has to look round the world at the many
humanitarian catastrophes that have resulted from such thinking to project
what consequences are likely to follow for ordinary Tibetans if the
separatist fantasy were fulfilled.
http://www.blackandwhitecat.org/2008/04/01/separatism-and-tibet/
Posted by google at 12:44 AM | Comments (0)
April 02, 2008
Uprising Movement Background
The Tibetan people stand at an important crossroads as two historic moments approach; the Beijing 2008 Olympics in China and the 50th commemoration of the March 1959 uprising against China’s occupation of Tibet. The Chinese government is attempting to use the Olympic Games as a platform to gain acceptance as a global leader and to promote its propaganda on Tibet. Beijing sees this moment as an opportunity to legitimize its rule in Tibet once and for all.
The Olympics will take place just months before Tibetans mark 50 years since His Holiness the Dalai Lama and tens of thousands of Tibetans were forced to escape Tibet and Chinese troops violently crushed the popular uprising in Lhasa and across the country. More than 1 million Tibetans have since died as a direct result of China’s occupation. At this critical time - as the Chinese leadership wages an unrelenting war on Tibetan religion and culture, and is drastically increasing the rate of Chinese population transfer into Tibet - the very survival of Tibetans as a people is at stake.
It is time for Tibetans to take control of our future through a unified and coordinated resistance movement. We must now proclaim to the Chinese and to the world that the desire for freedom still burns in the heart of every Tibetan, both inside Tibet and in exile. In particular, the time has come for Tibetans in exile to boldly demonstrate that even after 50 years, we long to return to our homeland. A return march from exile in India back home to Tibet is being organized and will revive the spirit of the 1959 Uprising.
The 2008 Olympics will mark the culmination of almost 50 years of Tibetan resistance in exile. We will use this historic moment to reinvigorate the Tibetan freedom movement and bring our exile struggle for freedom back to Tibet. Through tireless work and an unwavering commitment to truth and justice, we will bring about another uprising that will shake China’s control in Tibet and mark the beginning of the end of China’s occupation.
DECLARATION
In the spirit of the 1959 Uprising and in memory of all the courageous Tibetans who sacrificed their lives for Tibet’s independence and continue to resist China’s tyrannical rule, we declare the commencement of the Tibetan People’s Uprising Movement.
The Tibetan People’s Uprising Movement is a global movement of Tibetans inside and outside of Tibet taking control of our political destiny by engaging in direct action to end China’s illegal and brutal occupation of our country. Through unified and strategic campaigns we will seize the Olympic spotlight and shine it on China’s shameful repression inside Tibet, thereby denying China the international acceptance and approval it so fervently desires.
We call on Tibetans inside Tibet to continue to fight Chinese domination and we pledge our unwavering support for your continued courageous resistance. We call on Tibetans in exile and supporters in the free world to take every opportunity to protest China’s Olympic Games and support the Tibetan people’s struggle for freedom. We call on Tibetans everywhere to support the return march of Tibetan patriots to our homeland, Tibet.
DEMANDS
As we move forward with our movement we, the Tibetan People, commit ourselves whole-heartedly to this effort and demand that the Chinese government immediately:
1. Remove all obstacles to the unconditional return of His Holiness the Dalai Lama to Tibet and his rightful place as leader of the Tibetan people. The Dalai Lama is revered by Tibetans as our sole and undisputed leader. In recent years, Tibetans inside Tibet have repeatedly called for the Dalai Lama’s return for which many have been persecuted and still languish in prison.
2. Begin dismantling the colonial occupation of Tibet. Chinese colonial rule along with the transfer of Chinese into Tibet is marginalizing the Tibetan population and reducing us to a minority in our own country. The very survival of the Tibetan people and nation, represented by our language, religion, culture and traditions, is gravely threatened.
3. Release all Tibetan political prisoners from any form of detention and restore human rights to the Tibetan population. Thousands of Tibetans – including the young Panchen Lama Gendun Chokyi Nyima, Chadrel Rinpoche, Lobsang Tenzin, Trulku Tenzin Delek, Bangri Rinpoche, Dolma Kyab, Rungye A’drak, and Adruk Lopo – are being persecuted for the peaceful expression of their religious and political beliefs and all Tibetans living inside Tibet are systematically denied their basic human rights.
The Tibetan People also demand that the International Olympic Committee (IOC) immediately:
1. Cancel the 2008 Olympics in Beijing and never again consider China as a potential host country of the Olympic Games until Tibet is free. The Chinese government is committing cultural genocide in Tibet and does not deserve the honour of hosting such an internationally celebrated event.
4 January 2008
Tibetan Youth Congress
Tibetan Women’s Association
Gu-Chu-Sum Movement of Tibet
National Democratic Party of Tibet
Students for a Free Tibet, India
http://tibetanuprising.org/2008/03/11/background/
Posted by google at 09:14 PM | Comments (0)
March 29, 2008
For some young Tibetan exiles, Dalai Lama's 'middle way' is a road to failure
For some young Tibetan exiles, Dalai Lama's 'middle way' is a road to failure
By Somini Sengupta
Friday, March 21, 2008
DHARAMSALA, India: "Long live the Dalai Lama!" is the most common cry on the streets here.
Even so, the 72-year-old monk's refusal to call for independence from China more forcefully as it has cracked down on the protests in Tibet has sharpened disagreement with younger and more aggressive Tibetan exiles.
Tenzin Wangdue, who has spent the last 11 days shouting slogans, including some that the Dalai Lama would shun, is typical of the new generation. While not rejecting the Dalai Lama's authority, he believes Tibetans have to push harder if they are going to get anywhere. "They're not going to give total independence," he said of China. "But I think there's hope they're going to accept genuine autonomy if we say we want total autonomy."
Since March 10 the Dalai Lama has stuck to his "middle way" script and appeared remarkably affable, at least publicly, even as China accused him of masterminding the uprising and called him "a devil with a human face."
He has repeatedly said he advocates only nonviolence, presses not for independence but a "preservation of Tibetan culture," endorses China's role as host of the Olympic Games in August and is happy to speak to Chinese authorities, including President Hu Jintao.
"I'm fully committed to eliminate negative feelings among Tibetans and fear, distrust among Chinese," he said Thursday in his third meeting with reporters this week. Reminded of the latest slurs against him, he leaned back in his chair and howled with laughter. "As a Buddhist monk, whatever they call me, doesn't matter."
Yet, a handful of radical Tibetan exile groups have said angrily that the "middle way" has achieved nothing in nearly 30 years. They have called for an Olympic Games boycott, burned Chinese flags and refused to call off a march from here to Lhasa, Tibet's capital, which he has called impractical in opposing a mighty state intent on using force.
So the question arises of whether the Dalai Lama, who has spent the last 49 years here in India and built one of the most powerful exile movements in the world, is out of touch with his own people. Or is this monk, regarded by his followers as a reincarnation of Buddha, the ultimate political pragmatist?
There is no clear answer. Whether his doggedly conciliatory posture will ever assuage China's government, or whether his allies will intensify pressure on China on his behalf remains a mystery.
But a hint of his influence here bleeds through the often angry, inventive protests that have gone on nearly nonstop for over a week. For all the slogans of fury "Free Tibet" and "Death to Hu Jintao" China's president, the most common is a call-and-response homage: "Long live the Dalai Lama."
Nuns chant it. Scruffy young men with painted faces shout it. Indeed, half the town seems to have gone hoarse this week calling out his name. He remains revered.
Wangdue, 26, is representative of the foot soldiers of the Tibetan exile movement. Born here to refugee parents, he has never seen Tibet, but dreams of going there one day and coaching the first Tibetan soccer team. He will go back when there is freedom, he said, and though he has never farmed, he will become a farmer on the family's ancestral land.
He was educated in Tibetan schools here, raised on a curriculum that emphasized Tibetan suffering and Chinese atrocities, and studied politics and sociology in Delhi University, in the Indian capital. Twice he was arrested for protesting in front of the Chinese Embassy there.
This week, he was shouting "Free Tibet!" up and down the hills. During the protests, several Chinese flags were burned. "I'm a supporter of the Dalai Lama," he confessed. "But when I saw these demonstrations, the blood was boiling in me."
The most explicit face-off here came this week when the Dalai Lama summoned the groups organizing the march to Lhasa. He told them they would risk not only alienating their Indian hosts (the government does not like refugees agitating against China on Indian soil), but also invite fatal fire from Chinese troops on the border.
He told reporters after the meeting that while he welcomed dissent, he felt compelled to ask the groups to be "practical." They are after all the foot soldiers of his movement, and his appeal to them was a sign of how they present both opportunity and a headache for his movement.
"I have no authority, no power to say 'Shut up!' " he said. "I'm always telling them: 'You are fighting for our rights. But today we are almost a nation dying. This moment important is survival. Practical solution is necessary.' "
But voices of Tibetans here in the seat of the government in exile made it plain that while they had reverence for the Dalai Lama's leadership, they did not feel bound by his directives.
Tashi Phuntshok, 40, a resident of a dormitory for new refugees here, said he understood that the Dalai Lama's political strategy was intended to spare more Tibetan lives. If he called for independence, Phuntshok said, there would be outright war. "His Holiness, he is kind-hearted," Phuntshok explained.
"For us," he said, "it should be full independence."
Onpo Lobsang, rushing up the road on his way to pick up a banner for a demonstration, said he backed the march to Lhasa despite the Dalai Lama's reservations. "Our goal is the same, we need both sides," said Lobsang, 29, who came here with his parents at age 9. "He's the supreme leader, but we don't need to listen to everything he says. He is a Buddhist monk. We are common men."
Tsering Dorje, 34, came out of an Internet café on the same road, having scoured the Web for the latest news inside Tibet. He regarded the "middle way" as still the soundest strategy, but said that China would have to respond favorably soon for Tibetans to keep faith in the concept. "It's time for China to show whether it has the courage," he said. "If China doesn't change its stance, I will change my mind."
Samdhong Rinpoche, the prime minister of the Tibetan government in exile, said he recognized the "energy and fire" of younger, more radical exiles, but dismissed their expectations.
"They have all lived in a world of dreams," he said. "And they are driven by emotions."
He maintained that his cause enjoyed greater prospects of success than ever before. His statement offered a window into at least the rationales of the Dalai Lama's political circle.
Rinpoche, 69, also a monk, gave three reasons: first, that China would find it impossible to continue to suppress by force; second, that public opinion had become divided in China; and third, that his government's demands for greater autonomy had widespread international support, which China, as an aspiring world power, could not ignore forever.
"If you talk about the long-term Tibet issue, I am very much hopeful," he said. "I never live in dreams. I live in reality, and in the present."
The Dalai Lama has flatly said that to call for independence would be to lose the support of world leaders, including that of his hosts in India.
The Dalai Lama and the government here have had talks with the Chinese government since 2002, most recently last summer. On Thursday, he said he was ready to talk again, but not in Beijing, unless there was "a concrete development" in government policies toward Tibet. He did not elaborate.
China has said it will talk only if he gives up on a claim of independence. The Dalai Lama has said repeatedly that he has. "One hundred times, thousand times I have repeated this," he told reporters Thursday. "It is my mantra we are not seeking independence."
Posted by google at 01:11 AM | Comments (0)
Tibetans divided over protest strategy
Tibetans divided over protest strategy
Dalai Lama vows to quit if violence worsens, but youth voice frustration
updated 6:19 p.m. ET, Tues., March. 18, 2008
DHARMSALA, India - Tibetan exiles saw a chance to put China on the spot ahead of the Beijing Olympics, but never expected their protests to spread to Tibet and turn violent. Now the Dalai Lama is threatening to quit if his people don’t return to peaceful resistance.
It’s a warning he has used before — telling Tibetans to return to peaceful protests during 1989 unrest — but this time it comes amid deep divisions within the Tibetan community between those who back his pacifist approach and an angry young generation that demands action.
While the situation inside Tibet remains unclear, much of the violence last week appears to have been committed by Tibetans against Han Chinese — a fact that troubles the 72-year-old Dalai Lama, who has long called for Tibetans to have significant autonomy within China.
“Whether we like it or not, we have to live together side by side,” the Dalai Lama told reporters Tuesday in the northern Indian hill town of Dharmsala, seat of the Tibetan government-in-exile. “We must oppose Chinese policy but not the Chinese. Not on a racist basis.”
Though fearful of a Chinese crackdown — he compared the plight of Tibetans to that of “a young deer in a tiger’s hands” — the Dalai Lama insisted he could not abide violence by his own people. Peaceful protest is the only way, he said.
He said that if the situation gets out of control, his “only option is to completely resign.”
An aide later clarified that the Dalai Lama meant he would step down as the political leader of the exile government — not as the supreme religious leader of Tibetan Buddhists.
Regardless, his call for Tibetans to work with the Chinese stands in stark contrast to the “Free Tibet” chants of thousands of Tibetan youths, Buddhist monks and nuns who have marched the steep paths of Dharmsala in recent days, angry faces painted with Tibetan flags and chests smeared with blood-red paint.
They want action not diplomacy, independence not autonomy.
Youth activist cites frustration
“There is growing frustration among the younger generations. They have been talking for 20 years and nothing came out of it,” said Tsewang Rigzin, head of the Tibetan Youth Congress.
He urged “the protesters in Tibet to continue in their protests until China gets out of Tibet.”
While hesitant to directly criticize the Dalai Lama — who is deeply revered by Tibetans — and careful not to endorse violence, the younger activists warn that patience with his approach is running thin.
“I certainly hope the middle way approach will be reviewed. The Tibetan nation and Tibetan culture are on the verge of extinction,” Rigzin said.
Another activist, Tenzin Choedon, a 28-year-old student, said: “It is time for a change in Tibet and the Tibetan movement.”
The activists argue that the Dalai Lama is squandering a golden opportunity by not opposing China hosting the Olympics.
“We have to seize the opportunity of the Olympics,” said Rigzin. “We have to shift the spotlight while the whole world is watching to show the true color of China.”
The Youth Congress and other exile groups began a Dharmsala-to-Tibet walk on March 10 — just before Beijing was to kick off its Olympic celebrations with a torch run through Tibet. It was also the anniversary of a failed 1959 uprising in Tibet that forced the Dalai Lama to flee to India.
Posted by google at 01:04 AM | Comments (0)