Unrest in Tibet!!

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bd popeye

The Last Jedi
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One of our esteemed members ,Finn McCool, asked could we start a Tibet thread. Well apparently I said yes.

Tibet issues may be discussed in this thread. Politics of Tibet included. Do not discuss politics in any other threads!!!!!!

However>>> If there are any personal attacks, country bashing, trolling or flamming etc in this thread >>> It shall be CLOSED!!.

I'm taking the risk that our fine members can discuss this situation in an intelligent manner.


I will start this thread off with a few pics. There are plenty of pics of protest etc in these threads;

http://www.sinodefenceforum.com/chi...worlds-armed-forces-pictures-iii-11-3075.html

http://www.sinodefenceforum.com/chi...hinese-military-photos-11-3488.html#post79885

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In this image taken from ATV Hong Kong via APTN, security forces patrol & clean up debris from street in Lhasa, capital of southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region Sunday, March 16, 2008. Tibet's exiled government said Sunday that 80 people had been killed during protests in Lhasa as armed police and soldiers patrolled the capital's streets, enforcing a strict curfew in a security clampdown following violent demonstrations that drew negative publicity for China ahead of the Beijing Olympics

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Video images released on Saturday, March 15, 2008, by Chinese television CCTV, of the unrest in Lhasa, capital of southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region Friday, March 14, 2008.
 
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Autumn Child

Junior Member
Well I will start off with these intresting article not ussually seen in mainstream western media that are obviously biased. I have been monitoring this situation very closely lately as it seems to draw memories of my childhood being oppressed by Indonesian government. Makes me think why does everyone cares about tibetan so much and yet no one, absolutely no one (including China) cares about overseas chinese being oppressed and suffering a true cultural (and to some extent ethnic)genocide in the last few decades?

India wakes to a Tibetan headache


By M K Bhadrakumar

DHARAMSALA, India - Within hours of the violence and vandalism breaking out last Friday in Lhasa, capital of the Tibet Autonomous Region of China, the township of Dharamsala, nestled against the Indian Himalayas, was spruced up like an Old Dame anticipating a shipload of boisterous sailors who just docked at the port after months of seafaring.

The township is the seat of the Tibetan so-called "government-in-exile", presided over by the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader and temporal head of the 8,000-strong Tibetan community living here. (Dharamsala, also called "Little Lhasa", literally means "Rest House" and was established in 1849 by the British rulers of India as a garrison town.)

The Dalai Lama would have reason to be satisfied with the attention he is receiving from the hordes of Western media persons who have descended on Dharamsala in the past 24 hours. He has become a revitalized cause celebre in the international media ever since Lhasa erupted into violence. He scheduled a special conference on Sunday afternoon, after the big sharks of the Western media arrived. The occasion was pregnant with possibilities. At the conference, the Dalai Lama launched a tirade against the Chinese authorities. Most important, he point-blank refused to make any appeal for calm in Tibet in the worst unrest in Tibet for nearly two decades.

Protests spread from Tibet into three neighboring provinces on Sunday as Tibetans continued to defy a Chinese government crackdown. Angry demonstrations broke out in Tibetan communities in Sichuan, Qinghai and Gansu provinces.

The Tibetan capital of Lhasa was tense on Monday ahead of a midnight deadline for people who took part in the violent anti-Chinese uprising to surrender or face severe punishment. Tibetan officials say 16 people have died and dozens wounded in the violence, although other estimates put the figure much higher.

The Dalai Lama said, "The situation in Tibet has become volatile, and only a miracle power can control it, not me."

He seems to realize this may well be his last waltz. The potential for embarrassing China - and in particular, President Hu Jintao, who once headed the Chinese Communist Party in Tibet - has never been as great as in the runup to the Beijing Summer Olympic Games in August. The Dalai Lama accused China of unleashing a "cultural genocide" in Tibet and demanded an international probe. But, he said, "We want genuine autonomy and not independence [from China]."

Tibet has suddenly sailed into view. Violence has erupted in Lhasa after a gap of two full decades. Such large-scale violence was last witnessed in 1987. How much of the violence on Friday was pre-planned or orchestrated from outside Tibet, it is difficult to assess from Dharamsala. The Chinese authorities have alleged that the "Dalai Lama clique" instigated the violence. But one thing stands out.

The complete coordination with which the apparatus of the Tibetan "government-in-exile" has sprung into high-quality action on the political and propaganda front leaves little doubt that it was at the very minimum anticipating Friday's eruption. Tibetan activists here are more forthcoming. They darkly hinted they were indeed expecting the disturbances. But they refuse to elaborate how they knew or who their collaborators were or what they did with what they knew.

Set against the Himalayan peaks which still wear a brooding wintry look sprinkled with powdery snow, the Dalai Lama's palace and its surroundings provide a stunning location for a drama-filled political cause that mixes liberation theology yet defaces communism.

A dozen handsome-looking Tibetan youth with flowing hair and bold headbands spread the red Chinese national flags on the streets of Dharamsala and trample on them with a couple of Indian policemen silently watching. A shed has been erected at the gates of the Dalai Lama's palace where a "relay fast" is observed by Tibetan activists protesting against China's governance of Tibet.

Western television cameras eagerly lap up the images for beaming them to drawing rooms in Europe and North America. The Dalai Lama's palace basks in the warm spring sunshine of Western attention.

There is much excitement in the air in Dharamsala as the speaker of the United States House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, is expected in this Himalayan hamlet on Tuesday. It seems she is not having a stopover in Iraq and Afghanistan but is heading straight for Dharamsala. Pelosi took the initiative of arranging a Congressional medal for the Dalai Lama a few months ago, which China robustly protested. Beijing warned the George W Bush administration that such unfriendly acts could cast shadows on US-China relations.

The Dalai Lama insisted at the press conference that Pelosi's trip was long scheduled. He described her as an old friend. But her visit nonetheless comes at an awkward time for India. Delhi has adopted an attitude of "see no evil, hear no evil". But it remains to be seen whether the Chinese are impressed.

Actually, a delicate three-way diplomatic tango is likely commencing - involving the US and China, with India providing the turf - which can only turn out to be messy for India. There is an old African saying that when elephants clash, the grass gets crushed. China would see a pattern insofar as steadily through recent months, sections of the Indian corporate media, which have been traditionally known to serve as mouthpieces of American regional policy, have been on overdrive stirring up dust in India-China relations.

Influential voices in the Indian strategic community have also jumped into the fray, including former diplomats who served at the highest level in the Indian foreign policy establishment and are close to the ruling Congress party. Their plea is that Tibet is at the core of India's intractable border dispute with China. They claim China is displaying the iron in its soul by pressing its claims in the border dispute. According to them, China is deliberately "provoking" India because it is in no mood to settle the border dispute with Delhi until Beijing has "subdued" Tibet on its terms. They see the odds as heavily favoring China in its current shadow boxing with India, whereas, Tibet is Delhi's only leverage.

At the same time, there has been a pro-US shift in Indian foreign-policy orientations in general in recent years. The present government has worked hard to harmonize its regional policies with the US policy almost across the board. It has left virtually no stone unturned - be it over Kosovo, the Palestinian problem or Afghanistan.

From this perspective, the strong Indian reaction to the Lhasa violence assumes significance. First, it is not clear whether an Indian reaction was warranted on an issue which is patently China's internal matter. The question is of diplomatic propriety - and not the rights and wrongs of what took place in Lhasa. Second, Delhi cannot adopt double standards. Delhi is not going to be amused if any world capital makes it a point to begin pronouncing on incidents of violence that rock India from time to time. Delhi used to show irritation whenever Pakistan took note of Hindu-Muslim violence in India.

The Indian Foreign Ministry expressed its "distress" over the "unsettled situation and violence" in Lhasa. It called on "all those involved" (meaning, Tibetan agitators as well as Chinese authorities) to "improve the situation and remove causes of such trouble in Tibet".

Without doubt, Delhi has chosen to be prescriptive on an internal matter of China. But it can boomerang, even if it pleases Washington in the present instance. Ironically, news just trickled in that the 60-member Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) passed a resolution by consensus at its summit meeting in Dakar, Senegal, on Friday expressing "concern about the long-lingering, oldest unresolved dispute of Kashmir" and underscoring the organization's support of the Kashmiri people's right of self-determination.

The Indian Foreign Ministry promptly dismissed the OIC statement, saying, "The OIC has no locus standi [standing] in matters concerning India's internal affairs, including Jammu and Kashmir, which is an integral part of India. We [Indian government] strongly reject all such comments," the Indian Foreign Ministry pointed out.

Of course, Delhi did the right thing. No government in Delhi will countenance a dilution of India's sovereignty and territorial integrity. Equally, the central issue is whether the Dharamsala folks have a future. Indian strategists are exceedingly foolish to pretend Delhi holds a "Tibet card". A visit to Dharamsala will at once bring them face-to-face with the sobering reality that the Tibetan community here faces disarray once the 73-year-old Dalai Lama departs from the scene. He dominates the landscape with his sheer physical presence.

While hundreds of Tibetan demonstrators marched in the town center on Sunday, local Indians went on with their daily lives. The Indians and the Tibetan Buddhists live in water-tight compartments in Dharamsala. Even after 49 years, they hardly intermix. The Indians complain that the relatively more affluent Tibetan "refugees" are disdainful. This is especially so among second-generation Tibetans who otherwise feel comfortable with the Western nationals who throng to this exotic town in the Himalayas for a variety of reasons.

The local Indians complain wealthy Tibetans are buying up property at fancy prices. No matter what Indian strategists in their ivory towers may write, Tibet is not a "popular" issue among ordinary Indians. Therefore, there is a touch of surreality about the whole situation. There is a "civilizational" angle insofar as Indians are largely indifferent towards Buddhism. Western nationals throng the Buddhist monasteries in Dharamsala curious to know about Tibetan medicine, yoga, mysticism and of course Buddhist philosophy. But there are hardly any Indians to be seen in the monasteries except the odd tourist escaping the heat of the Indian plains.

The sad reality of Indian history is that the country gave birth to Buddhism, but in the name of "Hindu revivalism", it subsequently decimated Buddhism and ruthlessly removed all traces of it from the Indian cultural consciousness, though Buddhism still remains the finest flower of the Indian civilization in a philosophical sense.

It, therefore, becomes difficult for ordinary Indians to champion the issue of Tibet. The issue needs to be "oxygenated" in Indian opinion constantly, which is eventually bound to become tedious. But that is looking ahead. For the present, a lot of money is undoubtedly pouring into this little town under the rubric of "donations".

M K Bhadrakumar served as a career diplomat in the Indian Foreign Service for over 29 years, with postings including India's ambassador to Uzbekistan (1995-1998) and to Turkey (1998-2001).
 

Norfolk

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, by Choi Chi-yuk in Lhasa and Agencies, South China Morning Post, Monday, March 17, 2008 (via LexisNexis News):

Riots have spread from Tibet to Sichuan and Qinghai , with thousands of People's Liberation Army soldiers moving into the restive region to restore order and arrest looters and rioters.

Unconfirmed reports from the new flashpoint - in Sichuan's Tibetan-populated Aba county - said police had opened fire and reports of fatalities ranged from three to more than 10. "They've gone crazy," said a police officer there, her voice trembling down the telephone as the main government building came under siege.

The officer, who declined to be named, said a crowd of Tibetans hurled petrol bombs, burning down a police station and a market in the county's main town, and also torched two police cars and a fire engine. Security forces fired tear gas and arrested five people.

The Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy said on a website that People's Armed Police shot and killed at least seven protesters. A police officer, reached by telephone, denied this.

One ethnic Tibetan resident in Aba said there were loud sounds like gunshots and there was widespread talk of 10 or more dead.

and:

But last night, a Sichuanese surnamed Luo who runs a supermarket in west Lhasa said they had been besieged by angry Tibetans who tried to loot their shop. He said Han Chinese were arming themselves in self-defence.

More at the link.
 

optionsss

Junior Member
I know because of Olympics, China does not want to use deadly force, so she does not have to look bad. But if the rioter are just simply begin to loot and even kill innocent people, deadly force is necessary. And, they should stop force the monks to learn about the political propaganda, it will never work. Maybe that might reduce the resentment.
 

xuansu

New Member
Those looters and killers would have been shot on sight during the LA riot and post-Katrina. There, the police were "maintaining peace and order", where China would have been condemned for "brutality against peaceful demonstrators". I think the key reason this riot flared up is because these people believe the police's hands are tied, that they would be afraid of doing anything remotely harsh to avoid the "righteous condemnation from the Free Tibet crowd". And they were right. The police did pitifully little during the initial stage which allowed the situation to get out of hand.

Now I say the Chinese government should forget about the Olympics for a moment and just turn a deaf ear to all those call for "restraint", or "condemnations", and arrest each and every identifiable rioters, hold public trial, and execute them. The charge could be simply murder and accessory to murder.

As for the monks whose protest initially sparked the riot, they shouldn't be taught political propaganda as Optionsss says. Since nobody in China, not even the CCP members, really believes them anyway. Instead, everyone in Tibet should simply be taught the history of the origin of Dalai Lama, like how the title was conferred by the Qing Emperor on a submissive Lama, so he could better control Tibet. And that the so called "reincarnation" were also invented by the Qing Emperor so the Dalai Lama of those days could become a more mythical figure. And that the "reincarnation" didn't even get started until the THIRD Dalai Lama. Also that Dalai Lama once proclaimed Chairman Mao as also a reincarnated Buddhist figurehead of higher ranking than himself in the Buddhist hierarchies. That should really cut down the attraction posted by the Dalai Lama.
 

adeptitus

Captain
VIP Professional
Makes me think why does everyone cares about Tibetan so much and yet no one, absolutely no one (including China) cares about overseas Chinese being oppressed and suffering a true cultural (and to some extent ethnic)genocide in the last few decades?

This has been a problem for the past couple hundred years, not just limited to last few decades. Even during Qing era the government officials held a dim view on economic migrants as turncoats who abandoned their ancestral homes. To this day, an ethnic Chinese from Indonesia would find some level of discrimination in Taiwan.

Fortunately, things are getting better overseas, and the cultural oppression of Chinese Indonesians are slowly coming to an end.

As for commenting on the current Tibetan events, I think the PRC government's crisis management capability still needs a lot of improvement. From the EP-3 collision years ago to the recent snow storms, the crisis management response reminds me of FEMA and Hurricane Katrina. >_>
 

Gollevainen

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Now I will say this only once! There shall be no more calls for hold public trial, and execute them or other assorted mambojambo. This is a forum for civilized discussion and that does not include deathwishes for anyone, exspecially when none of you really have no real clue what actually happens there. So if you cannot discuss here without emotions, then back down, cool down and learn some selfretrain.

Like I said, I say this only once. After this the one that cannot behaive like an adult will be wishing its just PAP that its after him...:nono::nono:


Gollevainen
Spanish Inqvisition
 
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There are a lot of news articles out there, though it was interesting to note that Tibetan students were bold enough to mount a peaceful protest
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, though of course it was broken up in due course.
 

Vlad Plasmius

Junior Member
The fact ethnic Tibetans ended up carrying out attacks against Han Chinese and Hui Muslims doesn't inspire much confidence in a "free" Tibet.
 
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