TIBET TODAY.... "Ακατάλληλο για ΕΥΑΙΣΘΗΤΟΥΣ... "

Saturday, April 5, 2008

BEIJING (AFP) — China warned on Saturday it would step up a controversial "re-education" campaign for Tibetans after a fresh protest showed a huge security crackdown had failed to extinguish nearly one month of unrest. The statement in the state-run Tibet Daily newspaper called for Buddhist monks to become Chinese patriots, but activist groups said the heavy-handed techniques already employed in the campaign were inflaming tensions. Efforts by authorities to "re-educate" monks at a monastery in Sichuan province in southwest China led to protests there on Thursday in which at least eight Tibetans were killed, the activist groups said. China's communist rulers have been deeply angered and embarrassed over the Tibetan unrest, as it has overshadowed its preparations for the Beijing Olympics and shone a spotlight on a range of other human rights issues. Tibetans have been protesting to express anger over what they say has been widespread repression suffered under nearly six decades of Chinese rule. In Xinjiang, a Muslim-populated region of northwest China which neighbours Tibet, there have also been protests in recent days to express similar sentiments, although not on nearly the same scale as the Tibetan unrest. The jailing of prominent Chinese dissident Hu Jia on Thursday for subversion added to concerns around the world that the human rights situation in China was getting worse instead of better ahead of the Games. Those concerns were expected to be magnified on Sunday when the Olympic torch passed through London, with Tibetan activists and other groups vowing to add further heat to the flame there. In the Tibet Daily article, Tibet's deputy Communist Party chief was quoted as telling a group of influential monks that "reinforcing patriotic education" was now a top priority. "Guide the monks so that they continue to foster the tradition of love of religion, love of the country and to hold high the banner of patriotic progress," the paper quoted Hao Peng as saying. Hao was speaking on Thursday at the ancient Tashilumpo monastery in Shigatse, the seat of the Panchen Lama, who ranks number two in Tibetan Buddhist's hierarchy behind the Dalai Lama. "Especially reinforce education of young monks about the legal system so that they become patriots who love religion and observe discipline and law," he said. The International Campaign for Tibet said the re-education campaign, a tactic long used by the Communist Party, typically involved forcing Tibetans to denounce the Dalai Lama. The Dalai Lama fled his homeland in 1959 and remains a revered figure for Tibetans, although China believes he is a dangerous figure bent on achieving independence for Tibet. China says he is orchestrating the latest unrest, claims he denies. Such orders to denounce the Dalai Lama helped trigger Thursday's protest in Garze county of Sichuan province, International Campaign for Tibet spokesman Kate Saunders said. China's official Xinhua news agency reported on the incident late on Friday, saying police were forced to fire warning shots to put down a "riot" in which protesters attacked a government building and seriously wounded one official. "Police were forced to fire warning shots and put down the violence, since local officials and people were in great danger," Xinhua said. Xinhua did not give other key details in its brief dispatch, such as how many "rioters" were involved or why they had marched on the government office. The International Campaign for Tibet, the Free Tibet Campaign and Radio Free Asia reported that police had fired directly into the protesters, killing at least eight of them. The attempted re-education campaign had taken place at Tongkor monastery, which the Free Tibet Campaign said had about 370 monks. Independently verifying what happened, as with all the unrest, is extremely difficult because China has barred foreign reporters from travelling to Tibet and the other hotspot areas and blanketed them with security. The protests began in Tibet's capital, Lhasa, last month to mark the anniversary of a failed 1959 uprising against Chinese rule, then spread to other areas of western China with Tibetan populations, including Sichuan. China says Tibetan rioters have killed 18 civilians and two policemen. Before the latest unrest, Tibetan exiled leaders said 135-140 Tibetans had been killed in the Chinese crackdown. China has ruled Tibet since 1951, after sending in troops to "liberate" the Himalayan region the previous year.

posted by The Dutch Times @ 12:59 PM

Chinese terrorist: Genocide contunues in Tibet Tight restrictions for foreign students at Tibet University (Lhasa) Following the aftermath of the March 14 demonstration in Lhasa till the end of March, foreign students of Tibet University studying Tibetan language were restricted from leaving their university campus. For over a week their mobile phones, internet and other devices have been disconnected. Since a few days ago, a new rule has been imposed where if the foreign students of the University need to leave the campus for purchasing personal items, then special permission needs to be obtained. A maximum of 1-2 hour permission is given for them to leave the campus. 2 and 3 April In Tongkor Township, Karze County, Karze (Ch: Ganzi) "Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture," Sichuan Province - "Patriotic re-education" campaign continues; those not complying being arrested 2 April 2008: Chinese "work-teams" arrived at various monasteries including Tongor monastery, Tongkor Township, in their attempt to give "patriotic re-education" classes. Chinese "work-teams" also attempted a signature campaign to get people to denounce His Holiness the Dalai Lama and refer to him as a "splittist." The monk in charge of the monastery, Lobsang Jamyang, openly rejected the campaign. Yeshi Nyima, also a monk from Tongor monastery, stood up during a "patriotic re-education" session and shouted that the he would not provide his signature, even at the cost of his life. The other monks of the monastery also made the same statements. 3 April 2008: People's Armed Police (PAP) and Public Security Bureau (PSB) arrived at Tongkor monastery in response to yesterday's incident at the monastery. The PAP and PSB conducted thorough searches of all the monk quarters and confiscated portraits of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and the spiritual head of the monastery. They also took away mobile hand-sets and money belonging to the monks. Geshe Tsultrim Gyatso, a 70-year old monk who demanded that His Holiness the Dalai Lama's portrait not be taken down, was arrested and taken into custody. Laypeople (living nearby Tongor monastery) held a protest in support of the monks at Tongor monastery. Tsultrim Phuntsok, a 26 year old man, was arrested during the protest. Around 8 - 9 PM, loud gun shots were heard in the Tongor village area. Later it was confirmed that Nyima and Kabook (both monks from Tongor monastery) were severely injured from gunshots. Currently, we have no additional details on number of people injured or killed. There are around 300 monks at Tongor monastery. However, since the incident at Tongor monastery only a few senior monks remain at the monastery. Currently, we have no information on the whereabouts of the other monks. 2 April 2008 Bathang (Ch: Batang) County, Karze (Ch: Ganzi) "Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture," Sichuan province - China pressuring monks to denounce His Holiness the Dalai Lama Chinese "work-teams" arrived at Ba-Chodae monastery, Bathang County. There, they attempted to collect signatures from the monks which would support Chinese allegations that His Holiness the Dalai Lama was responsible for inciting the recent demonstrations in Tibet. Each of the 200 monks at the monastery refused to give into Chinese pressure by not providing their signatures. There were heated arguments between the monks and the "work-teams" leading to the arrest of five monks including the abbot of the monastery, Jigme Dorjee, and the Disciplinary in charge, Yeshi. Tawu (Ch: Daofu) County, Karze (Ch: Ganzi) "Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture," Sichuan province - Nuns hold prayer-march Around 10 AM, nuns from the nunnery (located on Ratroe hilltop) walked towards the crematorium (near the Tawu County headquarters) holding a prayer-march for those killed during the recent demonstrations in Tibet. On their way, the nuns were stopped by the police resulting in a heated argument. However, the police were not able to stop the determined nuns. Near the Tawu County headquarters' middle school, the nuns were stopped again when County officials backed by three trucks full of policemen arrived to stop the nuns from continuing their peaceful march. Students of the middle school and local people shouted slogans to support the nuns. The nuns successfully completed their prayer march. Nya-tso monastery monks who had initially planned to go on the prayer-march with the nuns, were pressured by Chinese police to not take part and instead were in restricted to stay in their monastery. *secrettibet posted by The Dutch Times @ 12:56 PM

Dalai Lama Envoy Says Tibet Is Grim WASHINGTON (AP) — The Dalai Lama's special envoy told lawmakers Thursday that China must bear full responsibility for recent violence and suffering in Tibet and said his homeland is being "brutally occupied." "The situation today is grim," Lodi Gyari said at a Congressional Human Rights Caucus briefing. Gyari, the top representative for the exiled leader of Tibet's Buddhists, called on senior lawmakers to make an "urgent visit" to Tibet to help show the world the misery there and to prevent China from "marginalizing" Tibetans. Since China's crackdown last month on the largest anti-government protests in Tibet in almost two decades, Gyari said, Tibet has become, "in every sense, an occupied nation, brutally occupied." He called for a permanent U.S. diplomatic presence in Lhasa, Tibet's capital, and an international investigation into the violence. Gyari also expressed disappointment in the United Nations, saying China's powerful influence, as a veto-wielding member of the Security Council, was causing the U.N. to "shut its eye on Tibet." China is working hard to contain violence ahead of the Beijing Olympic Games in August. It has sent thousands of police and army troops to Tibet to maintain an edgy peace, hunt down protest leaders and cordon-off Buddhist monasteries whose monks led protests that began peacefully on March 10 before turning violent four days later. Chinese officials have put the death toll at 22. But Tibetan exiles say nearly 140 people were killed. Beijing accuses the Dalai Lama, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, of orchestrating the violence to sabotage the Olympics and create an independent state. The Dalai Lama regularly says he wants "real autonomy," not independence for Tibet. He says Tibetans, not Chinese, must be allowed to make important religious, cultural and economic decisions. Gyari said the Dalai Lama does not support a boycott of the Olympics, which he believes could be a source of pride for ordinary Chinese. But, Gyari said, it would be "deliberately provocative and insulting" to Tibetans if the Olympic torch is relayed through Tibet. Republican Rep. Chris Smith, a frequent critic of China's human rights, compared the Beijing Olympics to Adolph Hitler's 1936 games in Berlin. He called on international aid groups to be allowed to visit Tibetan prisoners, who he said he feared would be tortured by Chinese officials. The crackdown in Tibet is a delicate matter for President Bush. His administration wants to be seen as a champion of human rights and has called for restraint in Tibet. Bush himself bestowed Congress' highest civilian honor on the Dalai Lama last year, infuriating Beijing. Bush says, however, that he will attend the Olympics in August. The administration is wary of angering China, a growing economic and military power that the United States needs to manage nuclear standoffs with Iran and North Korea. Gyari said the recent violence was partly a reflection of Tibetans' feelings of hopelessness. But, he said, Beijing "must bear full responsibility" for pushing Tibetans "to the limit." "China's government is playing a very dangerous game" by demonizing the Dalai Lama and portraying Tibetans as anti-Chinese, Gyari said. He called for a fundamental change in how Chinese leaders handle and think about Tibet. The Dalai Lama has been based in India since fleeing his Himalayan homeland in 1959 during a failed uprising against Chinese rule. China claims Tibet has been its territory for centuries, but many Tibetans say they were effectively independent for most of that period. posted by The Dutch Times @ 12:55 PM

IOC warns China over web access China must ensure open access to the internet during the Beijing Games, Olympic officials have warned. Inspectors from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) said China was obliged under its Games contract to provide journalists with web access. The IOC's Kevan Gosper said there was concern that the web had been blocked during recent unrest in Tibet. He said this could not happen during the Games. IOC inspectors are on a final visit to Beijing before the August Games begin. Internet 'management' Mr Gosper said blocking the internet during the Games would "reflect very poorly" on the host nation. "There was some criticism that the Internet closed down during events relating to Tibet in previous weeks - but this is not Games time," he said. "Our concern is that the press is able to operate as it has at previous Games during Games time." Some 30,000 journalists are expected to be in Beijing to cover the Games. China frequently blocks access to certain websites - often restricting access to foreign media sites. But foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu told the Associated Press that China's "management" of the internet followed the "general practice of the international community". She declined to say if the internet would be unrestricted for journalists during the Olympics, AP noted. *BBC posted by The Dutch Times @ 12:50 PM

China Alleges Tibetan 'Suicide Squads' by AUDRA ANG, Associated Press BEIJING (AP) — China has branded the Dalai Lama a "wolf in monk's robes" and his followers the "scum of Buddhism." It stepped up the rhetoric Tuesday, accusing the Nobel Peace laureate and his supporters of planning suicide attacks. The Tibetan government-in-exile swiftly denied the charge, and the Bush administration rushed to the Tibetan Buddhist leader's defense, calling him "a man of peace." "There is absolutely no indication that he wants to do anything other than have a dialogue with China on how to discuss the serious issues there," State Department spokesman Tom Casey said. Wu Heping, spokesman for China's Ministry of Public Security, claimed searches of monasteries in the Tibetan capital had turned up a large cache of weapons. They included 176 guns, 13,013 bullets, 7,725 pounds of explosives, 19,000 sticks of dynamite and 350 knives, he said. "To our knowledge, the next plan of the Tibetan independence forces is to organize suicide squads to launch violent attacks," Wu told a news conference. "They claimed that they fear neither bloodshed nor sacrifice." Wu provided no details or evidence. He used the term "gan si dui," a rarely used phrase directly translated as "dare-to-die corps." The official English version of his remarks translated the term as "suicide squads." Wu said police had arrested an individual who he claimed was an operative of the "Dalai Lama clique," responsible for gathering intelligence and distributing pamphlets calling for an uprising. The suspect admitted to using code words to communicate with his contacts, including "uncle" for the Dalai Lama and "skirts" for the banned Tibetan snow lion flag, Wu said. Beijing has repeatedly accused the Dalai Lama and his supporters of orchestrating violence in Lhasa, the Tibetan capital. Protests which began peacefully there on the March 10 anniversary of a 1959 uprising against Chinese rule spiraled out of control four days later. Chinese officials have put the death toll at 22, most of them Han Chinese; the government-in-exile says 140 Tibetans were killed. China also says sympathy protests that spread to surrounding provinces are part of a campaign by the Dalai Lama to sabotage the Beijing Olympics and promote Tibetan independence. The 72-year-old Dalai Lama has condemned the violence and denied any links to it, urging an independent international inquiry into the unrest. "Tibetan exiles are 100 percent committed to nonviolence. There is no question of suicide attacks," Samdhong Rinpoche, prime minister of the government-in-exile in Dharmsala, India, said Tuesday. "But we fear that Chinese might masquerade as Tibetans and plan such attacks to give bad publicity to Tibetans." Experts on terrorism and security risks facing Beijing and the Olympics have not cited any Tibet group as a threat. Scholars said the claim of suicide squads was a calculated move by China allowing it to step up its crackdown in Tibetan areas. "There is no evidence of support for any kind of violence against China or Chinese," said Dibyesh Anand, a Tibet expert at Westminster University in London. Instead, Beijing is "portraying to the rest of China and the rest of the world: these people are basically irrational" and that there was no room for compromise, he said. Tuesday's accusations could also further divide the Tibetan government-in-exile and other groups like the Tibetan Youth Congress, which has challenged the Dalai Lama's policy of nonviolence, Anand said. "This is a way of pressuring the Dalai Lama to renounce Tibetans who have created violence," he said. Andrew Fischer, a fellow at the London School of Economics who researches Chinese development policies in Tibetan areas of China, dismissed Wu's warnings as "completely ridiculous." What China is trying to do "is justify this massive troop deployment, a massive crackdown on Tibetan areas and they're trying to justify intensification of hard-line policies," Fischer said. Drawing from a deep historical reserve of angry rhetoric, Tibet's tough-talking Chinese Communist Party boss, Zhang Qingli, recently called the Dalai Lama a "wolf in monk's robes, a devil with a human face, but the heart of a beast" and deemed the current conflict a "life-and-death battle." State media has denounced protesting monks as the "scum of Buddhism." The campaign against the Dalai Lama has been underscored in recent days with showings of decades-old propaganda films on state television portraying Tibetan society as cruel and primitive before the 1950 invasion by communist troops. The escalation of the rhetoric to include claims of possible suicide attacks may also touch upon another sensitive issue for China's communist leadership — unrest in Xinjiang, a predominantly Muslim region to Tibet's north, and Beijing's tight security measures in the area. Last month, state media reported that a woman had confessed to attempting to hijack and crash a Chinese passenger plane from Xinjiang in what officials say was part of a terror campaign by a radical Islamic independence group, the East Turkestan Islamic Movement. The reports said the woman was from China's Turkic Muslim Uighur minority. While the United States has labeled the East Turkestan Islamic Movement a terrorist organization, the State Department alleges widespread abuses of the legal and educational systems by the communist authorities to suppress Uighur culture and religion. Fischer said China has tried to change the "nonviolent, compassionate" image of Tibetans into one of violence and brutality to draw parallels to the pro-independence stance in Xinjiang. "If they succeed in portraying them that way, then they can treat them the same way they treat Muslims in Xinjiang," he said. Associated Press writers Christopher Bodeen and Anita Chang in Beijing and Ashwini Bhatia in Dharmsala, India, contributed to this report. posted by The Dutch Times @ 12:42 PM

Olympics 'worsening China rights' China's human rights record is getting worse, not better, because of the Beijing Olympics, a rights group says. According to Amnesty International, China is clamping down on dissent in a bid to portray a stable and harmonious image ahead of the Games in August. It urged the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and world leaders to speak out against abuses, including China's handling of protests in Tibet. US President George W Bush is facing calls to boycott the Games' opening. "It would be clearly inappropriate for you to attend the Olympic Games in China, given the increasingly repressive nature of that country's government," a group of 15 US politicians wrote in a letter to Mr Bush on Tuesday. Mr Bush has said he plans to attend the ceremony but Germany's Angela Merkel says she will not. French President Nicolas Sarkozy has not ruled out a boycott. An IOC team is currently in Beijing to assess its readiness for the Games. 'Beyond reach' In a report entitled China: The Olympics Countdown, the London-based group said the Olympics had failed to act as a catalyst for reform in China. "Unless the Chinese authorities take steps to redress the situation urgently, a positive human rights legacy for the Beijing Olympics looks increasingly beyond reach," it said. "It is increasingly clear that much of the current wave of repression is occurring not in spite of the Olympics but actually because of the Olympics." Activists and dissidents had been targeted as part of an apparent pre-Olympics clean-up, it said, with many under some form of detention. Journalists, both domestic and foreign, were still prevented from reporting freely. The group also called on world leaders to speak out on the situation in Tibet, calling a failure to address the issue "tacit endorsement" of human rights abuses. It accused Chinese troops of using lethal force on Tibetan protesters and urged China to release information about those who had been detained, saying it feared for their safety. 'Prejudice' On Tuesday, ahead of the publication of the report, China hit out at Amnesty and said any attempt to pressure Beijing over the Olympics would fail. "The organisation holds prejudice against China, so you can imagine what kind of report it will release," foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said. Public Security Ministry spokesman Wu Heping also said that Tibetan "independence forces" were planning to launch suicide attacks as part of a wider uprising - a move he blamed on the Dalai Lama. China says 18 civilians and two police officers died in the unrest in Tibetan and neighbouring provinces inhabited by Tibetans that began on 10 March. Tibetan groups outside China put the death toll at up to 140, a figure that includes Tibetans they say were killed by Chinese security forces. All claims about the unrest are difficult to verify because the Chinese government has mostly barred foreign journalists from these sensitive areas. *BBC posted by The Dutch Times @ 12:40 PM

China cancels official Czech visit in Tibet flag row PRAGUE - China cancelled a visit by Czech education officials because Prague's government ministry raised a Tibetan flag in one of its windows, Chinese authorities said in a statement released here. "The displaying of the so-called Tibetan flag signifies direct support for the independence of Tibet," said the statement from the Chinese education ministry, released by China's embassy in Prague on Friday. "We cannot accept it and that is why we have cancelled this visit." The delegation to Beijing was to have been led by a vice-minister and included the heads of three top colleges, with the aim of signing a cooperation agreement including a bilateral student exchange programme. Communist China has ruled Tibet since 1951, after sending in troops to "liberate" the Buddhist region the previous year, and insists it is part of China despite Tibetan calls for independence. Reacting to the Chinese announcement, Czech education minister Ondrej Liska cited the issue of human rights in China. His comments came after reports of violence involving police and protestors in Tibetan-populated regions. "China's reaction is evidence that our criticism regarding human rights has not gone unnoticed," Liska said. He added that he was sure the bilateral agreement would eventually be signed. "It is also in China's interest." *phayul.com posted by The Dutch Times @ 12:37 PM

Chinese Harass Western Journalists on Tibet BEIJING, April 5 - Some Chinese nationalists have undertaken a campaign of harassment, including violent threats, against foreign reporters who took part in a recent trip to Lhasa, for alleged bias in their coverage of unrest in Tibet. The intimidation efforts have included hundreds of calls and text messages to the cellphones of reporters who took part in the government-arranged Lhasa trip late last month, including correspondents from The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and the Associated Press. The flood of threats began this past week after the cellphone numbers, Chinese names, and brief descriptions of several of the correspondents were published on a military-themed Internet bulletin board. Contributors to that site have boasted of making harassing phone calls, and posted their own violent threats. "Beat to death these unjust, conscienceless criminals," wrote one. The campaign is the latest escalation in a nationalist backlash against Western news coverage of the March 14 antigovernment riots in Tibet and their aftermath. The precise basis for the complaints isn't clear, although critics have circulated a few photographs published on news Web sites that they argue were misleadingly cropped or captioned. More broadly, the anger reflects deep-seated resentment among many Chinese -- fostered by decades of government propaganda -- at perceived interference in China's internal affairs by foreign governments and groups. The phone calls and text messages in recent days have ranged from relatively mundane denouncements to profane attacks on the reporters and their families to numerous threats of violence and death. ("You damned American devil, God will punish you. Tomorrow you will be hit by a car and killed.") Some Tibetans and their supporters also have responded in recent weeks with angry emails to Western reporters, complaining about what they claim is skewed coverage of the Tibet unrest in favor of the Chinese. It isn't clear how the contact information for the reporters who took part in the Lhasa trip made its way onto the Internet. China's government, which routinely censors material on the Internet that it doesn't like, has allowed the contact information to remain on the Web. The Wall Street Journal asked the company that hosts the bulletin-board site where the contact information was first posted, to remove it. The company said it couldn't do anything until Monday, citing a holiday in China. A Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs official, asked about the harassment at a routine news conference Thursday, said he was unaware of it. Ministry officials couldn't be reached Friday, which was a national holiday in China. *phayul.com posted by The Dutch Times @ 12:34 PM

China Blocks Reporting in Tibetan Areas By CARA ANNA DANBA, China: It was just after nightfall when three journalists were stopped at a police checkpoint on a winding, rutted road in China's western Sichuan province — territory that had become out of bounds for the foreigners. Police officers took them to a nearby town and locked them in a hotel overnight. They then escorted the journalists more than 250 miles back to the provincial capital, Chengdu, and left them with a warning. "If you come back, we will send you back again," one official said. The routine became drearily familiar over days of fruitless attempts to journey into Tibetan regions where the largest anti-government protests in almost 20 years erupted last month. Dozens of such checkpoints have sealed off a chunk of western China twice the size of France, keeping out foreign journalists and other unwanted visitors as part of a campaign to squelch bad publicity ahead of the Beijing Olympics in August. To avoid accusations of muzzling the media, officials deny the existence of a travel ban, saying only that reporters are recommended to keep away for their own safety. The de-facto ban on news coverage in China's Tibetan regions violates China's revised rules that are supposed to allow foreign journalists freedom to report through the Olympics. But in the sealed-off regions, officials wave those rules away, saying the current situation is a "special" one. Officials often try to sugarcoat the treatment with offers of tea and food, cigarettes, handshakes and a seeming concern for the journalists' well-being. "Sorry for the inconvenience," some say. "We warmly welcome you to come back another time," say others. "When all of this calms down, you can come back and have much better reporting conditions," said officials in Danba, where the three journalists were kept overnight. But it hasn't all been so polite. Policemen have waved guns in journalists' faces, confiscated passports and forced photographers to delete photos of checkpoints and riot police. Authorities say 22 people died in the March 14 riots in the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, while other reports put the death toll in the protests and ensuing crackdown at up to 140. New violence in Garze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in Sichuan province along the border with Tibet has led to eight more deaths, the London-based Free Tibet Campaign said Friday. Officials in the Tibetan areas of Sichuan, Gansu and Qinghai provinces all repeatedly warned of potential dangers to journalists from insurrectionist Tibetans, who live in the so-called "Tibetan autonomous regions" but have little say in a power structure dominated by China's majority ethnic Han Chinese. When pressed for details of the dangers, officials in the areas where riots and protests were known to have happened all claimed no knowledge of any unrest. The deputy head of the local government in the Aba prefecture in Sichuan province appeared to contradict himself Thursday when he told reporters that life was "completely normal" in the area, but that it was still too dangerous for foreign media. Some officials said they doubted the area would be open again until the Olympics are safely over. "Wait until September," one foreign affairs official in Aba said cheerfully as his car carried two journalists away from a checkpoint late Monday night. Travel to Tibet has always been tightly restricted, but such rules have now been extended to neighboring provinces. Bus stations have even been told not to sell foreigners tickets, and drivers face stiff punishments for picking up outsiders. But worried about further damage to Tibet's tourism industry, the regional tourism authority announced this week that Tibet will reopen to foreign tourist groups on May 1. Even if a foreign journalist gets past a checkpoint, he or she is usually caught after checking in at a hotel, where registration with a passport is required. In other cases, plainclothes policemen tail journalists, crimping their activities. On Thursday, a plainclothes tagged after a reporter as she walked Danba's main street, quietly trying to interview local Tibetans. The policeman then stopped the Tibetans and asked them what the journalist had asked. There is even interference far from the sealed-off areas. At a university campus in Sichuan's capital Chengdu, a journalist was barred from meeting with Tibetan professors by a woman who claimed herself to be a Tibetan professor. She then took photos of the journalist with her cell phone camera, claiming the blonde-haired woman looked like one of her sisters, and had her escorted off campus. While officials seemed to feel little need to justify their actions, at least one fell back on what has become a major thrust of Chinese propaganda. "The foreign media twist the Tibetan story very much, so we need to completely forbid them from wandering around," said one foreign affairs official. *phayul.com posted by The Dutch Times @ 12:33 PM

Sarkozy uses Olympics to pressure China on Tibet BEIJING: French President Nicholas Sarkozy stepped up the pressure on China Saturday over its handling of the Tibet crisis by warning he may boycott the Olympic opening, following fresh violence. Sarkozy's warning, delivered by one of his ministers in the Le Monde newspaper, also came shortly after China said it would step up a controversial "education" campaign for Tibetans in an effort to end nearly a month of unrest. Sarkozy will only attend the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony if China opens dialogue with exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama and frees political prisoners, French Secretary of State for Human Rights Rama Yade said. China must also end the "violence" against Tibetans, Yade told Le Monde, saying all three conditions were "indispensable" if he was to be at the opening ceremony in August 8. His comments were among the sharpest by a world leader over China's crackdown on what has become the biggest challenge to its rule of the remote Himalayan region in decades. Protests that began on March 10 in Tibet's capital, Lhasa, escalated into rioting and then spread to other areas of western China with Tibetan populations. China says Tibetan rioters have killed 20 people. But Tibetan exiled groups say 135-140 people have been killed in the Chinese crackdown. The death toll from the crackdown was before the latest outbreak of unrest, in southwest China's Sichuan province in Thursday, that left eight Tibetans dead, according to activist groups and Tibetan exiles. China's communist rulers have been deeply angered and embarrassed over the Tibetan unrest, as it has overshadowed preparations for the Beijing Olympics and exposed other human rights issues. Tibetans have been protesting over what they say has been widespread repression under nearly six decades of Chinese rule. In Xinjiang, a Muslim-populated region of northwest China which neighbours Tibet, there have also been protests in recent days to express similar sentiments, although not on nearly the same scale as the Tibetan unrest. The jailing of prominent Chinese dissident Hu Jia on Thursday for subversion added to concerns around the world that the human rights situation in China was getting worse instead of better ahead of the Games. But China showed no signs of backing down on Saturday. The state-run Tibet Daily quoted the region's deputy Communist Party chief as telling a group of influential monks that "reinforcing patriotic education" was now a top priority. "Especially reinforce education of young monks about the legal system so that they become patriots who love religion and observe discipline and law," the paper quoted Hao Peng as saying. The International Campaign for Tibet said the re-education campaign, a tactic long used by the Communist Party, typically involved forcing Tibetans to denounce the Dalai Lama. The Dalai Lama fled his homeland in 1959 and remains a revered figure for Tibetans, although China believes he is a dangerous figure bent on achieving independence for Tibet. China says he is orchestrating the latest unrest and refuses to hold talks with him. The 1989 Nobel Peace Prize winner denies fomenting the unrest. Such orders to denounce the Dalai Lama helped trigger Thursday's protest in Garze county of Sichuan province, International Campaign for Tibet spokesman Kate Saunders said. China's official Xinhua news agency reported the incident late Friday, saying police were forced to fire warning shots to quell a "riot" in which protesters attacked a government building and seriously wounded one official. Xinhua did not give other key details in its brief dispatch, such as how many "rioters" were involved or why they had marched on the government office. The International Campaign for Tibet, the Free Tibet Campaign and Radio Free Asia reported that police had fired directly into the protesters, killing at least eight. The attempted re-education campaign had taken place at Tongkor monastery, which the Free Tibet Campaign said had about 370 monks. Independently verifying what happened, as with all the unrest, is extremely difficult because China has barred foreign reporters from travelling to Tibet and the other hotspot areas and blanketed them with security. Calls by AFP to local government offices, hospitals and religious bureaus went unanswered or were met with denials of knowing anything about the incident. *phayul.com posted by The Dutch Times @ 12:32 PM

Activists hang “Free Tibet” banner to protest Olympic torch arrival London, April 5: Four Tibet independence activists were detained this morning after two activists abseiled off Westminster Bridge and unfurled a 74 square meter protest banner reading, "One World, One Dream: Free Tibet 2008," mocking China's Olympics slogan "One World, One Dream." The action took place on the eve of the controversial arrival of China's Olympic torch relay in London, amidst mounting pressure on the International Olympic Committee to remove all Tibetan areas from the relay route. Pema Yoko (25) of Greenwich, Conall Hon (26) originally from Belfast, Peter Speller (23) of Cambridge, and Dan Burston (22) of Birmingham were detained for their involvement in the action. Over a thousand Tibetans and supporters are expected in the streets of London on Sunday to condemn China's ongoing crackdown on freedom protests inside Tibet. The action by Tibet activists comes as reports of violent crackdown by Chinese authorities on Tibetan demonstrators emerge out of Tibet. Chinese paramilitary forces opened fire on a crowd of unarmed monks and laypeople in southeastern Tibet On April 3, killing at least 8 people. "The Chinese government wants the British public to celebrate China at a moment when Tibetans are being gunned down by Chinese forces for doing nothing more than speaking out for freedom," said Pema Yoko, National Coordinator of Students for a Free Tibet UK, a British born Tibetan and one of the activists detained. "With Tibetans being rounded up, brutalized and killed, it is unconscionable for the International Olympic Committee to allow China to take the Olympic torch through Tibet," she said. Chinese authorities in Tibet have stated their intention to ensure stability during the torch relay 'at all costs,' which means increased militarization of Tibetan areas. According to the Chinese authorities' own figures, thousands of people have been detained in recent weeks, with speedy show trials promised before May 1. “China's attempt to politicize the London leg of the torch relay was heightened this week when China's ambassador to Britain, Fu Ying announced her participation in the relay. Also, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is scheduled to officially receive the torch at 10 Downing Street,” the free Tibet group said in a statement. "It is appalling that Gordon Brown plans to receive the Olympic torch tomorrow. As someone with Chinese and British roots, I feel strongly that Britain must take a firm stance against China's abuses in Tibet," said Conall Hon (26), member of Students for a Free Tibet to abseil off the bridge. "If the Chinese government wants acceptance from the international community, it must immediately stop its baseless attacks on the Dalai Lama and start working toward a meaningful solution to the Tibetan issue." China's deadly attack on Tibetans in Tongkor Township (Karze County) in southeastern Tibet on April 3rd came after Chinese authorities detained two monks for possessing photos of the Dalai Lama following a raid by over 3,000 armed police at Tongkor monastery. The police opened fire on the crowd of over 700 people, nearly half of whom were monks, gathered to protest the arrests. All Tibetan areas remain closed off to independent media, but eyewitness reports from all across Tibet describe horrific beatings, suicide attempts by monks locked inside their monasteries, house-to-house searches, and large groups of Tibetans being boarded onto trains at Lhasa's new railway station. As the situation inside Tibet remains critical, several peaceful protests and actions are planned for tomorrow's relay here in London. *phayul.com posted by The Dutch Times @ 12:30 PM

This sunday protest against Burmese junta and China as Olympic torch comes to London Friday, April 4, 2008 This Sunday protest against China’s support for the Burmese regime as the Olympic Torch comes to London: Date: This Sunday - 6th April Time: 12:30-1:30 Location: Opposite Downing Street, at junction of Whitehall and Richmond Terrace, Map: http://tinyurl.com/yv54pt Nearest Tube: Westminster See the location here: On Sunday the Burma Campaign UK and the Burmese community will be highlighting China’s continued support for Burma’s brutal regime by holding a peaceful protest as the Olympic Torch comes to London. Why China? China arms the regime, supplying weapons, bullets and military vehicles to the brutal army. China finances the regime , by signing deals in the oil, gas, hydro-electric and mining sectors china provides the regime with an economic lifeline. China protects the regime by blocking UN Security Council action on Burma By providing economic, political and logistical support China is helping to keep the brutal generals in power in Burma. Join us this Sunday at 12:30. The torch only passes once so make sure you get there on time! See the location here: All the best and thanks for your support. Anna Roberts The Burma Campaign UK *whoiswhoinburma.blogspot.com posted by The Dutch Times @ 3:40 PM

Shameless leaked memo from the IOC Reporters Without Borders has obtained a leaked internal memo that International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge sent to all IOC members setting out a communication strategy for the Tibet crisis and the debate about a boycott of the Olympic Games. Rogge’s memo displays a level of arrogance and shamelessness that would be stunning, if it didn’t comport with how the IOC has always conducted itself on the issue of Tibet: The purpose of Rogge’s 17 March memo was to tell all IOC members what position they should take in response to the Tibet crisis and the media “speculation” about a boycott. In his introduction, the IOC president says the events in Tibet are disturbing but will not jeopardize the “success” of the Olympic Games. […] The memo, written by the IOC’s public relations department, rules out any direct IOC involvement in resolving the Tibet crisis, even if it recommends that members express their concern. “China’s involvement in Tibet strictly concerns its social and political policy,” the memo says. “It is not related to the country’s hosting of the Games, nor to its relationship with the IOC.” The memo repeats several times that the Olympic Games are serving as a “catalyst” for a dialogue on Tibet and its independence but rules out IOC involvement in the resolution of the “complex” crisis. The message that Rogge wants to get across is that “The IOC shares the world’s desire for the Chinese government to bring about a peaceful resolution as quickly as possible.” But the memo adds on the next page that the IOC does not raise such matters with countries that host the games. What Rogge is saying is that the IOC has partnered with the Chinese government, which is implementing a “disturbing” military crackdown in Tibet, but the situation is “complex.” What is so “complex” about the host government shooting civilians in the streets four months before the opening ceremonies? In this case, silence is the same as approval, given how the IOC is allowing the Chinese government to relentlessly exploit the Games for Beijing’s own political ends. Furthermore, Rogge tries to have it both ways, saying that China’s “involvement” (military occupation?) in Tibet is not the IOC’s concern, while simultaneously bragging that the Games are serving as a “catalyst” for dialogue on Tibet. Give us a break. The Games are serving as a lightning rod for Tibetans’ and others’ grievances, supported by NGOs across the world, but this is no thanks to the IOC, which has tried everything it can think of to avoid addressing these issues. The IOC continues to provide the Chinese government with valuable political cover on the Tibet issue, as well as many others. No amount of PR work or media “spin” will change that. *studentsforafreetibet.org posted by The Dutch Times @ 2:00 PM

Exclusive: Chinese police kill eight after opening fire on monks and Tibet protesters Chinese paramilitary police have killed eight people after opening fire on several hundred Tibetan monks and villagers in bloody violence that will fuel human rights protests as London prepares to host its leg of the Olympic torch relay this weekend. Witnesses said the clash – in which dozens were wounded – erupted late last night after a government inspection team entered a monastery in the Chinese province of Sichuan trying to confiscate pictures of the Dalai Lama. Officials searched the room of every monk in the Donggu monastery, a sprawling 15th century edifice in Ganzi, southwestern Sichuan, confiscating all mobile phones as well as the pictures. When the inspectors tore up the photographs and threw them on the floor, a 74-year-old monk, identified as Cicheng Danzeng, tried to stop an act seen as a desecration by Tibetans who revere the Dalai Lama as their god king. A young man working in the monastery, identified as Cicheng Pingcuo, 25, also made a stand and both were arrested. The team then demanded that all the monks denounce the Dalai Lama, who fled China after a failed uprising in 1959. One monk, Yixi Lima, stood up and voiced his opposition, prompting the other monks to add their voices. At about 6.30 p.m., the entire monastic body marched down to a nearby river where paramilitary police were encamped and demanded the release of the two men. They were joined by several hundred local villagers, many of them enraged at the detention of the 74-year-old monk Cicheng Danzeng, who locals say is well respected in the area for his learning and piety. Shouting “Long Live the Dalai Lama,” “Let the Dalai Lama come back” and “We want freedom”, the crowd demonstrated until about nine in the evening. Witnesses said that at around that time, as many as 1,000 paramilitary police used force to try to end the protest and opened fire on the crowd. It was not known if the demonstrators had been throwing stones at the police. In the gunfire, eight people died, according to a local resident in direct contact with the monastery. These included a 27-year-old monk identified as Cangdan and two women named as Zhulongcuo and Danluo. Witnesses said a 30-year-old villager, Pupu Deley, was killed, along with the son of a villager named Cangdan, and the daughter of villager Cuogu. Two other people, whose identities were not available, were also killed and dozens were wounded, the witnesses said. They said about ten people were still missing today, including another monk, identified as Ciwang Renzhen. Armed paramilitary police patrolled the streets of the village today and surrounded the monastery. All communications had been cut. The latest upsurge of violence highlights the difficulties the Chinese authorities are facing in trying to end nearly a month of protests across the Tibetan region and the depth of anti-Chinese sentiment among a deeply Buddhist minority loyal to the exiled Dalai Lama. It comes just as the issue of unrest has become a magnet for activists around the world who are criticising China’s human rights record as it prepares to host the Olympic Games in Beijing in August. The incident, which will cast a shadow of Beijing plans to reopen the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, to tourists by May 1, came as the authorities appeared to have regained control of the vast parts of China that have large ethnic Tibetan populations. In Lhasa, police issued their Number 13 most wanted list, bringing to 79 the number of people still sought for their roles in a deadly riot on March 14 when angry Tibetans rampaged through the streets of the Tibetan capital, stabbing and stoning ethnic Han Chinese and setting fire to hundreds of shops and offices. At least 18 people died in the violence. Lhasa authorities today sent out a message by mobile phone to residents, offering a reward of 20,000 yuan (£1,300) to anyone who could offer information leading to the arrest of those wanted for the violence. Two monks in the mountainous Sichuan province have committed suicide, according to Tibetan sources. A 32-year-old monk at Kirti monastery hanged himself in his room on March 27, leaving a signed suicide note. A 72-year-old from Guomang temple, apparently upset after being detained while en route to a religious ceremony with his disciples, returned to his monastery and killed himself. *timesonline.co.uk posted by The Dutch Times @ 1:52 PM

Chinese state media reports new violence in volatile Tibetan region of western China BEIJING (AP) - Chinese state media says new violence has broken out in a volatile Tibetan region, leaving at least one government official seriously injured. The official Xinhua News Agency said a riot broke out Thursday night outside government offices in the Garze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in Sichuan province along the border with Tibet. It said an official was "attacked and seriously wounded," but gave no other details. Late last month, Xinhua reported that protesters in Garze attacked police with knives and stones and killed one policeman. The violence was part of a wave of anti-government protests in Tibet's capital and Tibetan populated regions in surrounding provinces. posted by The Dutch Times @ 1:50 PM

Top names withdraw from relay as torch becomes beacon for protest Paul Kelso Beijing's plans for the London leg of the Olympic torch relay suffered a setback yesterday when it emerged that a number of torch-bearers, including the BBC's most senior journalist, have abandoned plans to take part in Sunday's event . There was also confusion surrounding whether or not China's ambassador to Britain, Fu Ying, would participate in the relay. With protest groups opposed to China's human rights record preparing to stage mass demonstrations along the 31-mile route, the Chinese embassy denied reports that the ambassador had withdrawn. But embassy officials said the ambassador was required to spend the day with a Chinese government delegation accompanying the torch, leading to confusion as to whether she would take part or not. In a later statement, the embassy said: "There has never been a view expressed from the Chinese embassy at any point that the ambassador is pulling out of the torch relay. She hasn't said that herself either." Mark Byford, the deputy director general of the BBC, has also backed out of a commitment to carry the torch amid concerns that his participation would compromise the corporation's journalistic standards. Gabby Logan, the sports presenter, is also understood to have withdrawn, having initially been included in a provisional list of celebrity torch-bearers. She cited a clash with her Sunday morning radio programme. Her husband, Kenny Logan, is taking part. Comedian Francesca Martinez also withdrew saying she felt that taking part would legitimise violence in Tibet. She told Channel 4 News: "I was very honoured to be asked, and very honoured to represent the disabled community. I fully support the Tibetan cause and in a way I feel that, because of the mounting pressure and the ongoing violence in Tibet, that torch-bearers should turn down their role ... because I feel that is truly promoting and supporting the Olympic ideals, which are unity and world peace, and that doesn't include invasion of other countries." Byford, who is second in command at the BBC, head of journalism across all networks and chair of the BBC's London 2012 co-ordinating group, provisionally accepted an invitation from the Beijing Olympic organising committee to carry the torch. With China's hosting of the Olympics an increasingly controversial subject he withdrew. "Mark Byford did provisionally accept an invitation to carry the torch, but then decided that as head of journalism it would be inappropriate to take part," said a BBC spokesman. "The torch relay is a major story and Mark might be required to make an important editorial decision, so he decided it would be inappropriate to take part." His withdrawal highlights the sensitivities surrounding the torch relay and Beijing's hosting of the games, and contrasts with the position of Sir Trevor McDonald, presenter of ITV's News at Ten, who will carry the torch. The torch relay, which left Greece last week and will visit 21 countries en route to Beijing, was intended to be a marketing exercise that would promote China and the Olympics around the world. Following a violent crackdown on protests in Tibet last month, and continuing unease over Beijing's support for Sudan's government, it has become a lightning rod for those opposed to the communist regime. Protests are planned in several of the major cities on the relay route, with Sunday's journey through London expected to be among the biggest. The Metropolitan police will launch a £1m security operation to ensure that the torch gets from its starting point at Wembley Stadium to the O2 arena in Greenwich unscathed. More than 2,000 officers will be on duty, with police cyclists accompanying the torch as it is carried by 80 runners on a route that passes through Piccadilly Circus, Trafalgar Square and Downing Street, where it will be greeted by the prime minister. Commander Bob Broadhurst, who will be in charge of the operation, said that his officers would respect the right of protesters to demonstrate and assist those groups that contacted them. Protesters who try to disrupt the passage of the torch could be detained until it has left London on Sunday night. If demonstrations should turn violent, the relay could be abandoned or rerouted at short notice. "If we had thousands of protesters who turned rough then we may take a pragmatic decision to move round them or go straight to the O2, but we will not be battling through people who are determined to stop the relay," Broadhurst said. *phayul.com posted by The Dutch Times @ 1:39 PM

Two monks commit suicide in Amdo Ngaba TCHRD According to confirm information received by the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy (TCHRD), two monks committed suicide in Amdo Ngaba (Ch: Aba) as a direct result of relentless oppression by the Chinese security forces after the series of peaceful protests. On 27 March 2008, a monk Lobsang Jinpa of Ngaba Kirti Monastery committed suicide. He hailed from Ngasib Village in Amdo Ngaba. In his signed suicide note, Lobsang stated, "the Chinese government has leveled false allegations against the monks of Kirti Monastery for leaking State Secrets to the outside world, leading and organizing the protests and for keeping the dead bodies of Tibetan protesters shot dead by the Chinese security forces. However, all the charges leveled by the Chinese government were not committed by anyone in Kirti Monastery, but carried out solely by me". The note further stated "I led the peaceful protest, and I am solely responsible for the protest". The suicide note carried a poignant end line, it reads, "I do not want to live under the Chinese oppression even for a minute, leave aside living for a day. " In another similar incident, a monk named Legtsok of Ngaba Gomang Monastery committed suicide on 30 March 2008. The deceased was 75 years old and hailed from a small hamlet in the upper flank of Ngaba prefecture. Sources say that days before committing suicide, on 30 March 2008, Legtsok accompanied by two other monks while on their way to perform prayer rituals at a house of a Tibetan family encountered a large contingent of Chinese security forces heading towards Ngaba Gomang Monastery to quell the protesting peaceful monks at the monastery. The forces brutally beat Legtsok and detained him for a few days. Later he was released and sent back to the monastery. Just moments before his suicide, he sent two of his disciples to return the money owned by his other disciples and relatives that was kept with him for safe keeping. Minutes after his disciples' departure, he committed suicide. When his disciples returned, they found him dead. He repeatedly told his two disciples that "he can't bear the oppression anymore". Those words served as premonition to his imminent death. Meanwhile on 3 April 2008, a monk of Ngaba Namtso Monastery was reportedly beaten to death by the Chinese security forces. Further information about the death could not be ascertained at the moment. TCHRD will issue update when further information surfaces regarding the death. According to Tibetan Buddhist doctrine, suicide is one of the gravest forms of sins violating the cardinal precepts of the doctrine. Buddhist monks of Tibet were known for their patience and resilience in the face of adversity. The cases of suicides point to an indication of Tibetan monks being pushed to the extreme limits of endurance and helplessness in the face of oppression and repression by the Chinese authorities in Tibet. In the light of the sad turn of events inside Tibet, TCHRD appeals to the world communities to immediately intervene and prevent the ongoing repression in the monastic communities in Tibet. The Centre strongly condemns China's brutal purging and threatening the existence of Tibetan Buddhism. phayul.com posted by The Dutch Times @ 1:38 PM

New Violence Reported in Tibetan Area New Violence Reported in Tibetan Area AP[Friday, April 04, 2008 21:51] By CHRISTOPHER BODEEN BEIJING - New violence has broken out in a volatile Tibetan region of western China, leaving eight people dead, an overseas Tibet activist group said Friday. China's official Xinhua News Agency said a government official was seriously injured. The London-based Free Tibet Campaign said police opened fire on hundreds of Buddhist monks and lay people who had marched on local government offices to demand the release of two monks detained for possessing photographs of the Dalai Lama, Tibet's exiled Buddhist leader. Xinhua made no mention of deaths or injuries among protesters, but said a "riot" had flared up Thursday night outside government offices in the Garze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture high in the mountains in Sichuan province along the border with Tibet. It said the official was "attacked and seriously wounded," and said police were "forced to fire warning shots and put down the violence." No other details were given. The report indicates continuing unrest in Tibetan areas despite a massive security presence imposed after sometimes violent anti-government demonstrations broke out last month in Tibet's capital Lhasa and neighboring provinces. Late last month, Xinhua reported that protesters in Garze attacked police with knives and stones, killing one officer. Matt Whitticase, spokesman for the London-based Free Tibet Campaign, said the incident originated at the Tonkhor monastery in Garze with government attempts to enforce a new "patriotic education campaign" _ a program of ideological indoctrination blamed for stirring deep resentment among monks. The campaign demands that monks denounce the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism who fled to India amid a failed uprising against Chinese rule in 1959. Whitticase said the chief monk, Lobsang Jamyang, refused to allow a government team to enter on Wednesday, but they returned Thursday with a force of about 3,000 paramilitary troops. The two monks, Geshi Sonam Tenzing and Tsultrim Phuntsog, were detained after photos of the Dalai Lama were found among their belongings. Soon afterward, the monastery's 370 monks marched on local government headquarters to demand their release, joined by about 400 lay people, Whitticase said. The group left after being told the two monks would be freed at 8 p.m., but returned after officials reneged. Along the way, they were confronted by troops at a road block, who opened fire on the crowd, Whitticase said. Whitticase provided the names of six of the eight people reportedly killed, who included at least three women and one monk. He said information on the incident had been relayed by a monk at a Tibetan Buddhist monastery in southern India, who received it from anonymous contacts in Garze. Stepped-up patriotic education has been ordered as part of a crackdown on dissent following deadly riots in the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, on March 14, in which authorities say 22 people died. Other reports say up to 140 people were killed in the protests and ensuing crackdown. Beijing has accused supporters of the Dalai Lama of orchestrating the violence, a charge the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize winner has repeatedly denied. Authorities earlier this week said they plan to put rioters on trial and reopen Tibet to foreign tourists by May _ a tight timetable that would allow the government to put the issue behind it ahead of the August Beijing Olympics. Both Tibet and Tibetan communities in three neighboring provinces where the protests spread, however, remain largely closed to foreign journalists. Outside of Tibet, police turned away foreign reporters at roadblocks leading into Tibetan areas, saying they were unsafe for travel. A state media report on Friday said officials in Tibetan areas were being forced into political study sessions in a bid to make sure Beijing's dictates are followed. "The numerous party members and grass-roots officials must further launch education in opposing separatism and preserving the unity of the motherland," the state-run Xinhua News Agency said, citing a notice from the party's powerful Organization Department, which oversees personnel issues. Communist troops marched into Tibet in 1950 and Beijing strengthened its hold on the region after the Dalai Lama fled in a failed uprising against Chinese rule in 1959. phayul.com posted by The Dutch Times @ 1:37 PM

Chinese Police Fire on Tibetan Protesters, Death Toll Unknown KATHMANDU — Paramilitary police in China’s southwestern Sichuan province fired on a crowd of Tibetan protesters demanding the release of two detained monks, killing and wounding an unknown number of people, Radio Free Asia (RFA) reports. At about 8 p.m. April 3, paramilitary People’s Armed Police fired on a crowd of several hundred monks from the Tongkor monastery in Kardze (in Chinese, Ganzi) and several hundred residents, witnesses told RFA’s Tibetan service. The witnesses, who declined to be identified, said they believed 15 people were killed and dozens injured, with scores more unaccounted for as of April 4. Phone communication with the region was cut off after the shooting and no further information was available. China’s official Xinhua news agency reported a “riot” late Thursday outside government offices in the Kardze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture but made no mention of any deaths. It said one government official was “attacked and seriously wounded” and that police were “forced to fire warning shots and put down the violence.” A source told RFA’s Cantonese service: “One monk has been killed, and seven Tibetans. Yesterday morning the police came to some Tibetan houses and asked them not to mourn those Tibetans who died in earlier clashes, and not to post the Dalai Lama’s pictures. Then they had a clash with the police. Many people have been beaten up and arrested.” The unrest around Tongkor monastery—unaffected by recent unrest in Tibetan areas until this week—began after Chinese authorities tried to launch a “patriotic education” campaign there aimed at quashing support for Tibetan demonstrations elsewhere. But when they tried to enlist the head lama, Lobsang Jamyang, on April 2, he refused, an authoritative source said. He is said to have told the authorities: “We cannot criticize the Dalai Lama, but I will discourage any incidents of protest here.” He also pledged to consult with the roughly 400 monks in his monastery, calling a meeting at which one monk, Yeshe Nyima, said: “We cannot criticize the Dalai Lama, even at the cost of our lives.” The other monks agreed, witnesses said. When Lobsang Jamyang recounted this to the police officer in charge, he replied: “We can use the challenge. Tell anyone who wants to rise up to go ahead and rise up, and we will crush them.” The police also searched the monastery, finding and destroying photos of the Dalai Lama and taking down photos of the monastery’s previous head lama, Tongkor Shabdrung, the witnesses said. Police then arrested a monk named Tsultrim Tenzin, 74, and a lay person identified as Tsultrim Phuntsok, 26, witnesses said. The following day, some 350 monks and another 350 lay people gathered to demand the men’s release. Officials told them to leave for 25 minutes and calm themselves, and the men would be freed. But the crowd refused to disperse, and at 8 p.m. police opened fire on the crowd at Tongkor subdivision, witnesses said. Tongkor falls under the administration of Kardze (Ganzi) county, a part of the Kardze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture. Those reported killed in the shooting include three monks, Samten, 27, Lobsang Rinchen, in his 20s, and Zunde; a man named Phurbu Delek, 30; six women identified as Sangmo, 34, Tenlo, 32, Tsering Yangzom, Tseyang Kyi, 23, Druklot Tso, 34, and Tsering Lhamo; and a young boy. The other victims couldn’t immediately be identified. Two monks, Nyima and Thubten Gelek, were described as “seriously injured.” Late last month, Xinhua reported that protesters in Kardze attacked police with knives and stones, killing one officer. Stepped-up patriotic education has been ordered as part of a crackdown on dissent following deadly riots in the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, which began March 14. Authorities say 22 people died. Other reports say up to 140 people were killed in the protests and ensuing crackdown. A duty officer at the Ganzi County Religious Affairs Bureau denied that any unrest had occurred. “No. Just lies. Who said that?” the official told RFA’s Cantonese service. Asked why monks would have left the monastery, the official replied: “Who said they left the temple? No. Everything is fine.” Calls to county government offices and the county police station rang unanswered. An official at the Ganzi Prefecture Public Security Bureau told RFA's Mandarin service: “I haven't heard about this.” But a Han Chinese resident said the unrest had been broadcast on television, saying: “It wasn't a protest. It was beating, smashing, and looting, like bandits. They couldn't have fired shots—from what I saw on television, the police were very restrained, talking to them, advising them." The shooting came after nearly three weeks of violence and unrest in Tibetan areas of China, in which scores of people are believed to have died and hundreds of people arrested. The Chinese government has effectively locked down Tibetan regions with a massive security presence. Original reporting by RFA's Tibetan, Cantonese, and Mandarin services. Translation by Karma Dorjee. Tibetan service director: Jigme Ngapo. Cantonese service director: Shiny Li. Mandarin service director: Jennifer Chou. Written and produced in English by Sarah Jackson-Han. *phayul.com posted by The Dutch Times @ 1:37 PM

Chinese activist Hu Jia jailed ahead of Olympics: lawyer Thursday, April 3, 2008 BEIJING (AFP) - - Activist Hu Jia was on Thursday jailed for three years and six months for subversion, his lawyer said, amid what rights groups charge is a campaign by China to silence dissent before the Olympics. The United States and the European Union spoke out in defence of Hu, who became the second Chinese dissident in less than two weeks to be jailed after using the Beijing Olympics to highlight human rights problems in China. Hu, for many years one of China's highest-profile human rights campaigners, was found guilty at a Beijing court of "incitement to subvert state power" following a one-day trial last month, lawyer Li Fangping said. Li said the subversion charge had related to the 34-year-old Hu posting articles on the Internet about human rights issues and speaking with foreign reporters. China's official Xinhua news agency carried a small article saying that Hu had confessed to his crime. "Hu spread malicious rumours and committed libel in an attempt to subvert the state's political power and socialist system," Xinhua said, citing the court verdict. However Li said Hu had pleaded not guilty and he would advise his client to appeal. Hu's wife, Zeng Jinyan, 24, who recently gave birth to their first child and is also a prominent rights activist, said the verdict was the culmination of four years of harassment by authorities. "He's been put under surveillance, been kidnapped. He's been put under house arrest and now they have sentenced him to three and a half years," Zeng told reporters outside the courthouse as she broke down in tears. "This is irrational and unfair." In one article he wrote with fellow activist and lawyer Teng Biao last year that was recently published by Human Rights Watch, Hu called on visitors coming to Beijing for the Olympics not to be fooled by the trappings of development. "You will see skyscrapers, spacious streets, modern stadiums and enthusiastic people. You will see the truth, but not the whole truth, just as you see only the tip of an iceberg," the pair wrote. "You may not know that the flowers, smiles, harmony and prosperity are built on a base of grievances, tears, imprisonment, torture and blood." Hu's verdict followed a jail sentence handed down on March 24 to Yang Chunlin, a former factory worker, on similar subversion charges. Yang, 52, was detained after he collected more than 10,000 signatures for a petition entitled: "We want human rights, not the Olympics". US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, in Bucharest for a NATO summit, later Thursday called Hu's jailing "deeply disturbing." But ruling out a boycott of the Beijing Olympics by President George W. Bush, she said: "The president has spoken to the fact that this is a sporting event -- but we have also said that we take seriously our obligation to talk to the Chinese about human rights before, during and after." Rights groups have regularly criticised China's use of the subversion charge as a tool to silence anyone critical of the Communist Party, a campaign they have said has intensified ahead of the Games and highlighted by Hu's sentence. "This verdict is... a warning to any other activists in China who dare to raise human rights concerns publicly," said Mark Allison, East Asia researcher for Amnesty International. "It also betrays promises made by Chinese officials that human rights would improve in the run-up to the Olympics." The European Union's spokesman in Beijing, William Fingleton, said Hu should never have gone on trial and called for him to be immediately released. Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao last month denied that Beijing was cracking down on dissidents ahead of the Olympics. "I think such accusations are totally unfounded. There is no such question at all," Wen said. Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu on Thursday repeated that denial, and insisted that Hu's case had been treated in accordance with China's laws. The International Olympic Committee refused to comment on Hu's case but denied that China's human rights record had worsened because of the Games, as charged by Amnesty and other rights groups. "To go that far to say the Games contributed to a worsening situation of human rights (in China), I mean I would call that blatantly untrue," senior IOC member Hein Verbruggen told reporters in Beijing. Hu's verdict also came as China's communist rulers remained under international pressure over its handling of a crackdown on more than three weeks of unrest in Tibet. *afp posted by The Dutch Times @ 1:57 PM

Tibet ordered to ramp up propaganda against Dalai Lama following protests By CHRISTOPHER BODEEN, AP BEIJING -- China has ordered stepped-up propaganda and ideological education in Tibet, in an apparent acknowledgment that years of political indoctrination have failed to curb support for exiled Buddhist leader the Dalai Lama. The region's hard-line Communist Party leader also ordered harsh punishment for local party officials found lacking in their political commitment to Beijing's official line during sometimes violent anti-government protests last month and the crackdown that followed. China has accused the India-based Dalai Lama of orchestrating the violence to sabotage the Beijing Olympic Games and achieve an independent state. The 72-year-old Dalai Lama has denied the charges, calling on Beijing to begin a dialogue and examine the economic, ethnic and religious issues that he says fueled anger among Tibetans. The Tibet Daily newspaper on Thursday quoted regional party chief Zhang Qingli as telling a meeting of officials to maintain their guard against future plots by the "Dalai clique." Zhang ordered officials to boost ideological education among young people, focusing on negative portrayals of Tibet prior to the Communist invasion in 1950 and continued vilification of the Dalai Lama's political agenda. "Unceasingly build up the foundation of the masses to oppose separatism," Zhang was quoted as saying. While China has claimed overwhelming support for its policies in Tibet, it has had to impose repeated ideological campaigns and heighten restrictions over religious observance and monastic life. Already, officials including the national police chief have ordered boosted "patriotic campaigns" in monasteries whose monks led protests that began peacefully on March 10 before turning deadly four days later. *chinapost.com.tw posted by The Dutch Times @ 1:52 PM

Muslims attempt uprising in China: gov't BEIJING -- China has accused Muslims in the nation's northwest of trying to start a rebellion, following what an exile group said Wednesday were peaceful protests against injustices under Chinese rule. The unrest occurred in China's Muslim-majority Xinjiang region last month, after Chinese authorities warned that "terrorists" based there were planning attacks on the Beijing Olympics and had tried to bomb a Beijing-bound plane. In the latest incident, extremist forces tried to incite an uprising in a marketplace in Khotan city on March 23, according to a statement from the local government posted on its Web site this week. It did not reveal how many people were involved in the protest, but said up to 100,000 people were in the market when the unrest occurred. An exiled group representing people in Xinjiang said up to 1,000 people were involved in two protests there on March 23 and 24. "A small number of elements... tried to incite splittism, create disturbances in the market place and even trick the masses into an uprising," the Khotan government statement said. It said the people involved adhered to the "three evil forces," a Chinese expression that refers to separatism, religious extremism and terrorism. "Our police immediately intervened to prevent this and are dealing with it in accordance with the law," added the statement. Most of the population in Xinjiang, which borders Afghanistan and central Asia, are Muslim Turkic-speaking Uighurs, many of whom say they have been subjected to 60 years of repressive communist Chinese rule. Rights groups and Uighur exiles have alleged that China is trying to stoke fears about terror attacks in Xinjiang as an excuse to crack down on dissent and justify tight control there ahead of the Olympics in Beijing in August. In the Khotan unrest, a Uighur exile group said people took to the streets to protest over a local businessman who died in police custody and against a ban on women wearing traditional head scarves. "The Uighurs began protesting after the killing of Mutallip Hajim, who had died in police custody," Alim Seytoff, head of the US-based World Uighur Congress, told AFP. "The women were also protesting the ban on head scarves." The two protests included up to 1,000 demonstrators, he said, adding that as many as 600 had been detained. Hajim, a wealthy jade trader and philanthropist, was taken into custody in Khotan in January, according to the US government-backed Radio Free Asia. But his body was turned over to his family on March 3, with police instructing them to bury him immediately and inform no one of his death, it said. Local police and the religious affairs bureau in Khotan, also known as Hetian, refused to comment on the protests or Hajim's case when contacted by AFP. China initially raised the alarm over the alleged threat from Xinjiang on March 9 when it said a January raid on "terrorists" there had foiled a planned attack directed at the Olympics. On the same day, it announced a 19-year-old Muslim woman had tried to bomb a Chinese Southern Airlines flight that had taken off from Urumqi, Xinjiang's capital, and was on its way to Beijing. The Khotan protests came as China was trying to contain unrest on a much larger scale in neighboring Tibet, a Buddhist region whose population similarly claim widespread repression under Chinese rule. China has blamed exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, who won the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize, as being behind the unrest in Tibet, claims he denies. Nicholas Bequelin, a Hong Kong-based China expert at Human Rights Watch, said it was worrying the Khotan government had publicly responded to the unrest there by immediately blaming "terrorists and extremist forces." "The authorities are not making a distinction between protesters, rioters or the peaceful expression of political opinion, they are mixing this all up and painting it with the same brush," Bequelin said. *chinapost.com posted by The Dutch Times @ 1:51 PM

Dalai Lama wants end to crackdown NEW DELHI -- Tibet's spiritual leader the Dalai Lama on Wednesday appealed for international pressure on Beijing to halt what he charged was a mounting Chinese military crackdown in his homeland. "Chinese authorities have deployed large contingents of troops in these traditional Tibetan regions and have not only started to crack down heavily on the Tibetans allegedly involved in the unrest, but also sealed off the areas where protests have taken place," the Dalai Lama said in a statement. He asked "world leaders, parliamentarians, NGOs and (the) public" to call "for an immediate end to the current crackdown, release of all those who have been arrested and detained, and the provision of proper medical treatment." Quoting "reliable sources" in his homeland, the exiled spiritual leader said there were also reports of "many injured Tibetans being afraid to go to Chinese-run hospitals and clinics." "I would also request you to encourage the sending of an independent international body to investigate the unrest and its underlying causes as well as allow the media and international medical teams to visit affected areas," he said. An international presence would "not only instill a sense of reassurance in the Tibetan people, but will also exercise a restraining influence on the Chinese authorities," the Buddhist spiritual icon added. Exiled Tibetan leaders have said at least 135 Tibetans have died in the Chinese crackdown with another 1,000 injured and many detained. China has reported a total of 20 deaths, 19 of them in the Tibetan capital Lhasa, which was shaken by violent anti-Chinese riots last month in which Western tourists said Tibetans attacked Chinese civilians with rocks and torched buildings. The Dalai Lama's appeal came two days after New Delhi told the 72-year-old Nobel laureate not to use India as a springboard for an anti-Chinese political campaign. "The Dalai Lama can stay here as India's guest but he should not do anything that harms India's diplomatic ties with China," Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee said at a public function on Monday. "There has been no change in this policy formulated by (India's first prime minister) Jawaharlal Nehru," Mukherjee said in the eastern state of West Bengal, which has a sizeable Tibetan population. "Tibet is an autonomous region of China," Mukherjee said, referring to India's stand on the Himalayan territory. The Dalai Lama's headquarters in the northern Indian town of Dharamshala declined to react to Mukherjee's comments but said Tibetans are grateful to New Delhi for granting them sanctuary on Indian soil since 1959 following a failed uprising against Chinese rule in Tibet. "We're very grateful to the people and the government of India for all they have done for Tibetans and the Indian government has done as much as it can in areas where it has been able to," the Dalai Lama's spokesman Tenzin Takla said by telephone. The protests began in Lhasa on March 10 to mark the anniversary of the abortive uprising in the remote Himalayan region and escalated into deadly rioting in Lhasa four days later. It also spread to other areas of western China with Tibetan populations. The Dalai Lama fled to India after the 1959 uprising disguised as a Chinese soldier. *chinapost.com posted by The Dutch Times @ 1:50 PM

China denies pre-Olympic crackdown on dissidents BEIJING, April 3, 2008 (AFP) - - China on Thursday denied it was cracking down on dissidents ahead of the Beijing Olympics, after high-profile rights activist Hu Jia was jailed for subversion. "We can't accept the accusation. China is a country with the rule of law. Everyone is equal before the law. We can't stop implementation of the law because of the Olympics," foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said. ADVERTISEMENT "The (Hu Jia) case has been dealt with in accordance with the law." Hu, 34, received a three-and-a-half year prison sentence earlier Thursday for "subversion of power," based on articles he published online. The United States and the European Union denounced the verdict against Hu, who for several years has been one of China's most active and high-profile human rights campaigners. Hu's wife, Zeng Jinyan, 24, who recently gave birth to their first child and is also a prominent rights activist, said the verdict was the culmination of four years of harassment by authorities. "He's been put under surveillance, been kidnapped. He's been put under house arrest and now they have sentenced him to three and a half years," Zeng told reporters outside the courthouse as she broke down in tears. "This is irrational and unfair." Rights campaigners also criticised the verdict, saying it was part of a crackdown on dissent ahead of the Olympics, in direct violation of Chinese promises prior to winning the right to host the Games. "This verdict is... a warning to any other activists in China who dare to raise human rights concerns publicly," said Mark Allison, East Asia researcher for Amnesty International. "It also betrays promises made by Chinese officials that human rights would improve in the run-up to the Olympics." In 2001, China promised that if it won the right to host the Games, "tremendous" human rights improvements would ensue, a pledge repeated in October by Liu Jingmin, Beijing's vice-mayor and a top Games organiser. Spokeswoman Jiang told the rights groups not to interfere in China's internal matters. "We hope the relevant organisations can respect China's law and not interfere with China's internal affairs with the excuse of human rights," she said. Hu, for many years one of China's highest-profile human rights campaigners, was found guilty at a Beijing court of "incitement to subvert state power" following a one-day trial last month, lawyer Li Fangping said. Li said the subversion charge had related to the 34-year-old Hu posting articles on the Internet about human rights issues and speaking with foreign reporters. "The evidence was publishing articles on websites outside of China and accepting interviews with the foreign press," Li said outside the court, adding he believed the verdict was unjust and he would advise his client to appeal. *afp posted by The Dutch Times @ 1:40 PM

China calls on Nepal to go tougher on pro-Tibetan groups

KATHMANDU - China has asked the Nepalese government to prevent pro-Tibetan groups from operating in Nepal, official media said Thursday. Terming the growing protests by Tibetans in Nepal as "illegal political activities," China asked Nepal to take stringent measures to prevent anti-Chinese activities, the official Rising Nepal newspaper reported. China has sought to quell Tibet-related demonstrations in the region, which have proven an embarrassment as it steps into the international spotlight as host of the Summer Olympic Games in August. Human rights groups have criticised both China and Nepal for their handling of the Tibet protests. Rights groups charged them with violating protesters' basic rights, including the right to assembly and freedom of speech, and with using excessive force. The Chinese reaction followed Tibetan protests on Tuesday and Wednesday in Kathmandu during which demonstrators tried to march on to the Chinese embassy in the latest of nearly daily protests in the Nepalese capital since 10 March. "The ringleaders of Tibetan organisations here, some of whom are plotting behind and some are conducting protests, urged the Tibetans demonstrators to storm the embassy," Chinese ambassador Zheng Xialing charged, according to the newspaper report. Zheng claimed anti-Chinese forces were operating in Nepal camouflaged as Tibetan protestors and were attempting to sabotage relations between the two countries. "We hope the Nepalese government adheres to a one-China policy and does not allow anti-China forces," Zheng said. "Our long-term friendly relations should not be undermined by these forces." Zheng alleged that most of the protestors in Kathmandu were associated with the Tibetan government in exile and described them as "separatists," a charge China has long levelled against the exiles. The Dalai Lama, Tibet's spiritual leader and head of its government in exile, has insisted he does not seek independence from China, only greater autonomy for Tibet within China, although some Tibetans involved in the recent protests have called for independence. Nepal's government has said there is no change in its policy of recognising Tibet as an integral part of China and would not allow anti-Chinese activities despite coming under growing criticism from the United Nations and human rights groups. More than 1,500 Tibetan demonstrators have been detained since the beginning of anti-China protests in Kathmandu. Rights groups have charged the Nepalese authorities with threatening the refugees involved in demonstrations with deportation back to Tibet, a charge denied by Nepalese authorities.

Friday, March 21, 2008

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