Tibetan monasteries 'surrounded by soldiers'

[DaShi]

Originally posted by Kidicious


The West clearly deserves it given the press coverage. And that's a bit hypocritical btw. The West vilifies China and then claims that China is vilifying the West. I don't blame the Chinese at all for not allowing Western reporters into the area.

The "West" doesn't necessarily villify China. Rather it reports on what it sees. Since China blocks half the picture, the West can't always report reliably there. You can't complain that the West doesn't paint a fair picture of China, when you block them from reporting.

[DaShi]

Originally posted by GePap


No, the sad results of the referendum are even better evidence that people aren't jumping on the "lets declare ourselves not part of China" bandwagon.

Does that bandwagon have a pedal for you to go back on?

2. Are you aware of Mr. Ma's stance on China?

Yes, no talks about political reconciliation at this time, period. That does not change the fact that the party wanting better relations with China, and urging people not to vote for a popular referendum on asking to join the UN under the name Taiwan won.

So you don't know more than that? He said a lot more about China than that. But this is enough to show that your original statement was bollocks.

Just found your rant against a unified Chinese state silly.

So you made a stupid unrelated statement?

[DaShi]

Originally posted by GePap




It's cute how you think of me so much Dashi, really, but you really need to give up this obsession of yours.

Oh man. One post tearing you down and you think your God. Get over yourself.

qIts cute though that you are trying to make the kid feel better.

Well, you are a whiny *****.

[DaShi]

Originally posted by LordShiva
Here's a good article.

Sorry! Teh administrator has specified that users can only post one message every 30 seconds.

I'm reading "Oracle Bones" right now and I was just thinking along the lines of this article while Hessler was discussing some of the laments of the Uighurs. I thought how can you explain the Tibetan's actions to a Han Chinese who is upset about them?

Imagine that you grew up in a town, your parents grew up there and their parents too. Your friends come from there and you hope to marry and have children there too. You proudly call it your hometown and loved it for better or worse. Now imagine that someone from another town comes over and says that this is not your town, it's his. Not only that, it was always his. He brings his people with customs and beliefs so very foreign to you and forces you to adopt them. He says that you can stay, if you can survive. How would you feel?

[SlowwHand]

Mass arrests in Tibet; Bush urges China to talk

By Benjamin Kang Lim and Lindsay Beck
Wed Mar 26, 5:37 PM ET

BEIJING (Reuters) - Chinese authorities have launched mass arrests of Tibetans in Lhasa for interrogation about the fiercest anti-Chinese uprising for decades, a Beijing-based source told Reuters on Wednesday. ADVERTISEMENT



President George W. Bush urged Chinese President Hu Jintao by phone to open dialogue with the exiled Dalai Lama. Hu said China would not talk to the man it accuses of fomenting deadly riots and trying to sabotage the Beijing Olympics.

The province of Qinghai, hundreds of kilometers (miles) from Lhasa, was the latest area to see unrest. Ethnic Tibetans staged a sit-down protest after police stopped them from marching, said the Beijing-based source who had spoken to residents.

"They (police) were beating up monks, which will only infuriate ordinary people," the source said of the protest on Tuesday in Qinghai's Xinghai county.

A resident confirmed the demonstration, saying paramilitaries had dispersed the 200 to 300 protesters after half an hour, armed security forces had filled the area and that workers had been kept inside their offices.

The Tibetan uprising and China's response are at the centre of an international storm ahead of the Olympics in August.

The head of the European Parliament on Wednesday questioned whether European leaders should attend the opening of the Games and invited the Dalai Lama, the exiled leader of Tibetan Buddhism, to address the EU legislature on events in Tibet.

The unrest began with peaceful marches by Buddhist monks in Lhasa more than two weeks ago. Within days, riots erupted in which non-Tibetan Chinese migrants were attacked and their property burned until security forces filled the streets.

China says 19 people were killed, at the hands of Tibetan mobs. The Tibetan government-in-exile says 140 died in Lhasa and elsewhere -- most of them Tibetan victims of security forces.

Protests have spread to parts of Chinese provinces which border Tibet and have large ethnic Tibetan populations.

The Beijing-based source said authorities were now rounding up Tibetans in Lhasa in the wake of the unrest.

"It's very harsh. They are taking in and questioning anyone who saw the protests," the source said. "The prisons are full. Detainees are being held at prisons in counties outside Lhasa."

The Dalai Lama has lived in exile in India since fleeing Tibet in 1959 after a failed uprising against Chinese rule. He denies masterminding the latest demonstrations.

BUSH TALKS TO HU

U.S. President George W. Bush telephoned Chinese President Hu Jintao on Wednesday, a White House spokeswoman said.

"The president raised his concerns about the situation in Tibet and encouraged the Chinese government to engage in substantive dialogue with the Dalai Lama's representatives and to allow access for journalists and diplomats," she said.

Hu asserted that the Dalai Lama was behind the violence and "efforts to disrupt the Beijing Olympics," and so Beijing could not conduct talks, according to a Chinese government Web site.

Hu, former Communist Party chief in Tibet, crushed unrest there in the late 1980s. He defended the latest crackdown.

"Any responsible government, faced with such violent criminal acts that are a serious violation of human rights, that seriously disrupt social order and seriously jeopardize people's lives, property and safety, would not just sit there and watch," the Web site paraphrased him as saying.

International calls have grown for China to show restraint in its response to the unrest, but few urge an outright boycott of the Beijing Games.

The speaker of the Tibetan parliament in exile said the Games should go ahead but be used to pressurize Beijing.

Beijing-backed scholars vowed to press ahead with "patriotic education" of the rebellious monks in Tibet's monasteries.

"The purpose of patriotic education is because the Dalai clique has been trying hard to disrupt development in Tibet and disrupt the normal practices of Tibetan Buddhism," Dramdul, who heads the Religious Studies Institute at the China Tibetology Research Centre in Beijing, told a news conference.

LHASA RAILWAY

Protests continued elsewhere. A Tibetan man tried to set himself on fire in eastern India, as Indian security forces stopped him and hundreds of other marchers from entering Sikkim state, which borders China, according to a local police officer.

A small group of foreign and Chinese reporters arrived in Lhasa on Wednesday, tightly supervised by Chinese authorities.

The Dalai Lama expressed surprise. "Really? Then very good, but it should be with complete freedom -- only then you can assess the real situation," he told reporters in New Delhi.

In a letter circulated by the Washington-based International Campaign for Tibet, a Lhasa resident described tight controls on religion and resentment over the influx of Han Chinese residents since a rail link was built to the remote, mountain region.

Lhagpa Phuntshogs, head of the China Tibetology Research Centre, accused protesting monks of wanting to restore the serfdom of Tibet's pre-communist past.

"What do they want? I think it's very clear that they want to try to restore the old theocracy in Tibet. The separatist elements are not happy with the end of theocracy in Tibet ... and they are not happy with the end of backwardness in Tibet."

[DaShi]

I can't understand the CCP's refusal to talk with the Dalai Lama. They seem to only be shooting themselves in the foot, in regards to international opinion, by doing this. Also, the Dalai Lama seems to be the best chance to pacify the region and create a "harmonious society" in Tibet.

They claim that they have evidence that he was behind the violent protests, but have not presented this evidence. If they do, they'd better choose someone better than Colin Powell to present it.

[SlowwHand]

I don't know what to think about China's thought processes. You're right, if they even madea token effort that was readily evident as such, that would be pretty poor. To refuse, period, is insane. That's my opinion.

[Dinner]

The CCP brought foreign journalists into Lhasa for the first time since the protests in order to put on a dog and pony show about how everyone just loves the CCP. In the middle of the show about 30 Tibetan monks broke in and started protesting Chinese occupation of Tibet.

I'm sure the poor bastards were in a gulag before night fall.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7315895.stm

[Wezil]

Don't watch the Olympics. Call/write your local Olympic TV network and tell them you won't be watching.

[Wezil]

from Oerdin's link:

Monks disrupt Tibet media visit

The monks pressed around the foreign journalists at the temple


Footage of the monks
Tibetan monks have disrupted a tour by the first foreign journalists invited by China to visit Lhasa since protests erupted two weeks ago, witnesses say.
About 30 monks shouted pro-Tibetan slogans and defended the Dalai Lama as journalists toured the Jokhang Temple, the visiting reporters said.

China has accused the Dalai Lama of masterminding the protests.

But US President George W Bush has urged Beijing to begin dialogue with Tibet's exiled spiritual leader.

Foreign journalists were expelled from Tibet at the height of the unrest, but on Wednesday China allowed a group of about two dozen reporters into Lhasa for a three-day escorted visit. The BBC's request to be included in the group was turned down.

The monks' protest came as they toured the Jokhang Temple - one of Tibet's holiest shrines.

One monk shouted "Tibet is not free, Tibet is not free" before he started to cry, an AP journalist at the scene, Charles Hutzler, reported.

Another monk said the rioting on 14 March "had nothing to do with the Dalai Lama".


China has increased its security presence in Lhasa since the unrest
The monks said they had not been allowed to leave the temple since the rioting.

Government handlers told the journalists to leave and tried to pull them away, the reporter said.

Later, the area around the Jokhang Temple was sealed off by riot police.

The protests began on 10 March and developed into violent rioting in Lhasa before spreading to neighbouring regions.

China says 19 people were killed by rioters. The Tibetan government-in-exile says about 140 people have been killed in a crackdown by Chinese security forces.

'Divided city'

The group of journalists has also visited a medical clinic and a clothing store where Chinese authorities say five girls were trapped and burned to death, AP's reporter added.

It certainly seems like a damaged city

Charles Hutzler, Associated Press


In quotes: reporters in Tibet
A reporter for the London-based Financial Times, meanwhile, said that the Tibetan quarter of the city resembled a war zone, with burnt-out buildings, shuttered businesses and groups of soldiers on every corner.

"The smell of burning buildings still hangs in the air nearly two weeks after violent rioting swept through the old Tibetan quarter of Lhasa," the Financial Times's Geoff Dyer reported.

The rioting appeared to have been more prolonged and destructive than previously thought, he wrote.

Charles Hutzler described to the BBC a city divided.


The journalists will spend three days in Lhasa
"In sort of the more recently built up, very Chinese part of Lhasa, life seems to be going on fairly normally... But in the older, Tibetan section of the town and the blocks leading to it we could see the remains of burnt-out buildings.

"It certainly seems like a damaged city, and I mean not just physically but psychically as well," he added.

The reporters said there was a heavy security presence in the Tibetan quarter with squads of police and soldiers on every corner.

But in the new town, they described life as returning to a semblance of normality with shops and restaurants busy with customers.

Treading carefully

On Wednesday, Mr Bush had "encouraged the Chinese government to engage in substantive dialogue with the Dalai Lama's representatives," White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said.

But the fact that it has taken Mr Bush this long to talk directly to Mr Hu shows that the US is treading carefully in its response, says the BBC's Jonathan Beale in Washington.

Despite calls from rights groups for an Olympic boycott, the White House has already made it clear that Mr Bush will still attend the opening ceremony of the Beijing Games.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by DaShi
The "West" doesn't necessarily villify China. Rather it reports on what it sees. Since China blocks half the picture, the West can't always report reliably there. You can't complain that the West doesn't paint a fair picture of China, when you block them from reporting.

Bull****. I've seen the early news footage, and then I saw the actual video footage or what was going on in Tibet. What's going on is a bunch of violent rioters looking for people to beat up and trashing everything, and in my opinion with no good reason. And then you have the Chinese showing restraint. There's no evidence whatsoever of abuse by the Chinese govt. You are so full of it, you know that?

[Wezil]

You've been BS'd and don't even realise it.

[Kidlicious]

No you have Wezil.

[Wezil]

Yes, the Chinese troops simply handed out milk and cookies and explained how wrong the protestors were.

There is a reason all you saw were hooligan Tibetans and restrained Chinese troops.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by Wezil
Yes, the Chinese troops simply handed out milk and cookies and explained how wrong the protestors were.

There is a reason all you saw were hooligan Tibetans and restrained Chinese troops.

You don't know what the Chinese troops did. The point is that the initial news reports were anti-Chinese govt biased, making China look like the bad guy in this when in fact the rioters initiated everything and behaving very poorly. So there's no reason to expect China to allow Western reporters into the province.