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Turmoil in Tibet after deadly violence10 hours ago
BEIJING (AFP) — Tibet braced for the worst Saturday after a day of violence in the capital Lhasa, where police opened fire to quell the biggest anti-Chinese protests in two decades and some deaths were reported, officials and rights groups said.
The protests, which spread outside Tibet into other areas of China, came amid a growing international campaign by Tibetans to challenge Beijing's rule of the Himalayan region ahead of the Olympic Games in August.
China's state-run Xinhua news agency confirmed that police had fired warning shots and used tear gas to disperse the demonstrating crowd in the heart of old Lhasa.
Several people lost their lives and many others were injured in Lhasa on Friday, an official at the city's medical emergency centre told AFP, with Radio Free Asia reporting at least two people had been killed by Chinese bullets.
Xinhua said many police officers had been injured but did not elaborate.
Dense smoke covered central Lhasa, as several buildings, including a mosque, were set on fire, Xinhua said. An eyewitness inside Lhasa also reported seeing a mosque ablaze, according to the the London-based Free Tibet Campaign.
Police cordoned off several sections of downtown Lhasa and were on the lookout for new violence, according to the Xinhua report.
The regional government "took emergency measures to rescue residents under attack," Xinhua said, including reinforced protection of schools, hospitals and gas stations.
Local government imposed heightened control on Lhasa's main streets Friday night, while sending out a "sabotage" warning via TV, calling on viewers to take unspecified precautions.
Xinhua said police had not announced any arrests. It also said the violence had died down early Saturday, but that burning wreckage in the streets was left from the previous day's clashes.
The tense situation triggered a United Nations call for calm.
"We urge that care be taken by all concerned to avoid confrontation and violence," said UN chief Ban Ki-moon's press office.
The United States, Britain and other European states expressed concern over the violence, with the White House calling on Beijing to "respect Tibetan culture" and the US ambassador here asking officials to "act with restraint".
Tibet's exiled spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, said the protests were a result of public resentment of the "brute force" employed by China to maintain control of the region for more than 50 years.
"I therefore appeal to the Chinese leadership to stop using force and address the long-simmering resentment of the Tibetan people through dialogue with the Tibetan people," he said in a statement issued from his base in India.
"I also urge my fellow Tibetans not to resort to violence."
But Tibet's Communist government blamed groups close to the Dalai Lama for "organised, premeditated and masterminded... sabotage," Xinhua said early Saturday.
A spokesman for the Dalai Lama, Chhime R. Chhoekyapa, reacted swiftly, calling the Chinese accusation "absolutely baseless."
The New York-based Human Rights Watch said security forces had responded to anti-Chinese demonstrations by beating protesters, firing live ammunition, surrounding monasteries and cutting phone lines into places of worship.
More than 100 Buddhist monks kicked off the protests early Friday, which quickly attracted hundreds of other Tibetans and saw one of the biggest markets in Lhasa as well as cars set ablaze, foreign tourists and rights groups said.
At least 900 people rioted in Lhasa, and more than 1,000 security forces were sent in to quell the unrest, the Free Tibet Campaign said, citing Tibetans in the city.
The official at the medical emergency centre in Lhasa said staff were overwhelmed by the number of victims.
"We are very busy with the injured people now -- there are many people injured here. Definitely some people have died, but I don't know how many," a female official at the centre said by phone.
Radio Free Asia, a US-funded broadcaster, said there had been terrible clashes between Tibetans and Chinese security forces.
"Chinese police fired on rioting Tibetan protesters in Lhasa on Friday, killing at least two people, as Tibetans torched cars and shops and anti-Chinese demonstrators surged through the streets," it said.
The unrest spread outside Lhasa, with monks leading a rally of up to 4,000 people in Xiahe, Gansu province, the site of one of Tibetan Buddhism's most important monasteries, the Free Tibet Campaign said, citing Tibetan sources there.
The unrest followed three days of protests by hundreds of monks in Lhasa, India and elsewhere around the world that marked the anniversary of a failed Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule in 1959.
China has ruled Tibet since 1951, a year after sending troops in to "liberate" the region from what it said was feudal rule. The Dalai Lama, fled to India following the failed 1959 uprising.
Tibetan rights groups have vowed to pile intense pressure on China over its controversial rule of the region in the lead-up to the Summer Olympic Games, when the world's spotlight will be put on the nation's communist rulers.
The protests are the biggest since 1989, when current Chinese President Hu Jintao was the Communist Party chief of Tibet.
Hu is due to be re-elected on Saturday by the nation's rubber-stamp parliament as president for another five years.
AFP: Turmoil in Tibet after deadly violence
Developments Related to Tibet Crisis
By The Associated Press – 2 hours ago
Tibet developments at a glance:
TURMOIL IN TIBET — Protests led by Buddhist monks against Chinese rule in Tibet turned violent, filling the provincial capital of Lhasa in smoke from tear gas, bonfires and burned shops. According to eyewitness accounts and photos posted on the Internet, crowds hurled rocks at riot police, hotels and restaurants. The U.S. Embassy said Americans had reported gunfire. U.S. government-funded Radio Free Asia reported two people were killed.
DALAI LAMA COMMENT — Tibet's spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, called the protests a "manifestation of the deep-rooted resentment of the Tibetan people," and urged both sides to avoid violence. In Dharmsala, India, the site of Tibet's government-in-exile, he urged China's leadership to "stop using force and address the long-simmering resentment of the Tibetan people through dialogue with the Tibetan people."
U.S. COMMENT — White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe said Beijing needs to respect Tibetan culture and multi-ethnicity in its society. "We regret the tensions between the ethnic groups and Beijing," he said, adding that President Bush has said consistently that Beijing needs to have a dialogue with the Dalai Lama. The U.S. ambassador to China has urged the government to "act with restraint" in dealing with the protesters, said State Department spokesman Sean McCormack.
OLYMPIC OUTLOOK — The violence poses difficulties for a Communist leadership that has looked to the Aug. 8-24 Olympics as a way to recast China as a friendly, modern power. Too rough a crackdown could put that at risk, while balking could embolden protesters, costing Beijing authority in often-restive Tibet.
RICHARD GERE COMMENT — Buddhist actor who has advocated Tibetan independence for 30 years said no one should be surprised by the uprising. "They've been brutally repressed for 50 years, 55 years, close to six decades. When you repress the people, they will explode. All people will explode."
EU APPEAL — European Union leaders appealed to China to show restraint in Tibet, but the criticism of Beijing's response to the demonstrations did not go so far as to threaten a boycott of the Beijing Olympics. EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said: "As far as the Olympic Games are concerned I intend to be there."
INDIA PROTEST — Police have clashed with scores of pro-Tibet protesters near the Chinese Embassy in New Delhi, arresting dozens of them. The chanting protesters were trying to reach the embassy, in a wealthy New Delhi neighborhood, when they were stopped by police. Police could be seen arresting at least two dozen people.
NEPAL PROTEST — Police scuffled with about 1,000 protesters, including dozens of Buddhist monks, during a rally in Nepal's capital of Katmandu in support of demonstrators in Tibet. About 12 monks were injured.
U.N. PROTEST — Dozens of Tibetans held a noisy protest against Chinese rule outside the United Nations, and six were arrested. Psurbu Tsering of the Tibetan Association of New York and New Jersey said its members received phone calls from Tibet claiming 70 people had been killed and 1,000 arrested in the Chinese province. The reports could not be verified.
Hosted by Copyright © 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
Violent Protests in Tibet Catch China Off-Guardby Anthony Kuhn
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Tibetans throw stones at Chinese army vehicles as a car burns on a street in the Tibetan capital of Lhasa after violent protests broke out Friday. AFP/Getty Images
Several days of protests in Tibet turned violent Friday, as demonstrators threw rocks and burned shops and cars in the capital, Lhasa, and casualties were reported.
The U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights urged Beijing to respond with restraint, as did the United States and the European Union.
The protests appear to have caught China off-guard just months before it hosts the summer Olympics.
Eyewitness accounts say that Friday's violence was centered in Barkhor, the heart of old Lhasa and the site of similar violent protests nearly 20 years ago.
Reports say that demonstrators burned shops and vehicles in Barkhor and pelted police with stones.
The U.S. Embassy in China warned American travelers to stay off the streets.
The protests began peacefully on Monday. Monks from the three main Buddhist monasteries around Lhasa marched in remembrance of a failed 1959 uprising against Chinese rule.
From his home in exile in Dharamsala, India, Tibet's spiritual leader the Dalai Lama spoke then of "increasing brutality and repression" in Tibet.
"For nearly six decades, Tibetans in the whole of Tibet have had to live in a state of constant fear, intimidation and suspicion under Chinese repression," he said.
"But in addition to maintaining their religious faith, a sense of nationalism and their unique culture, the Tibetan people have been able to keep alive their basic aspiration for freedom."
In recent days, protesters have demonstrated outside Chinese diplomatic missions in several cities around the world. In India, police arrested about 100 protesters marching toward the border with Tibet.
Tsewang Rigzin is president of the Tibetan Youth Congress, a Dharamsala-based organization of exiles involved in the march. He says the run-up to the Beijing Olympics was the perfect opportunity to make a statement.
"This is a golden opportunity for our struggle. Tibet has been under Chinese occupation for the last 50 years, and we never had such an opportunity to shine the spotlight on the brutal Communist Chinese regime in Tibet," he says.
On Friday, the Dalai Lama appealed to China's leadership to address what he called the long-simmering resentment toward Chinese rule over Tibet.
China's government did not comment Friday on the escalation in violence. On Thursday, Qin Gang, China's Foreign Ministry spokesman, blamed the unrest on the Dalai Lama.
"This was a political plot carefully planned by the Dalai's group to separate Tibet from China and disrupt the normal, stable and harmonious life of the Tibetan people," he said.
Lodi Gyari is the Dalai Lama's envoy to the U.S. He says that now, just as 50 years ago, Tibetans are protesting restrictions on basic religious freedoms. And he has told the Chinese this in negotiations.
"I said … don't make mistakes again. Just go back and see what happened in the early, mid-1950s. But they never learn. They just think that they have the upper hand," he says.
Observers note that when the last wave of major unrest shook Tibet — in 1989 — the region's Communist Party boss did not hesitate to unleash a harsh military and political crackdown. That boss, Hu Jintao, is now China's president.
Related NPR Stories
March 14, 2008
Tibet Scholar in U.S. Reflects on ProtestsMarch 14, 2008
Anti-China Protest Becomes Violent in TibetMarch 14, 2008
Tibetans Burn Chinese Shops in Major ProtestMarch 14, 2008
Monks' Protest Rejects Chinese Rule in Tibet
NPR: U.S. Scholar: Protests a 'Disaster' for China, Tibet
The Tibetan protest coincides with the tenth anniversary of the Tibetan uprising.
This indicates that the Tibetans have not been assimilated by the Han culture and suzerainty as has not the Uighurs of Xinjiang.
The idea that the Tibetans had been assimilated by China to the mainstream prompted China to open up Tibet to tourists and since tourists are present in Tibet, this protest could not be put a lid to as it is done in Xinjiang against news of such protests by Uighurs being blanketed out.
The BBC showed that even though there is this protest ongoing in Tibet, the Chinese news have blanked it out.
One wonders what will be the reaction in Xinjiang. Already the Chinese have claimed that two attempts to sabotage the Olympics including an attempt to hijack an aircraft from teh Xinjiang capital to Beijing was foiled.
One also wonders if the Olympics will be incident free.
