This article is published in Taiwan Journal March 20, 2008.
By June Tsai
The ROC Ministry of Foreign Affairs blasted China for its heavy-handed response to demonstrations that took place in Tibet starting March 10, with the Tibetan community in Taiwan and local pro-democracy supporters calling for international condemnation of Beijing's suppression of the Tibetan people.
The MOFA denounced China's crackdown that reportedly left as many as 103 people dead, saying that Beijing's actions contradict the image of a peaceful and harmonious country that China has been trying hard to foster ahead of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games. "Though the PRC authorities have ordered a media blackout to attempt to conceal the truth of events, the fact that it is an anti-democratic regime is all too clear," the MOFA said in a March 15 statement, adding that China's deployment of missiles pointing at Taiwan is another example of PRC aggression.
The protests that were started by Buddhist monks in Tibet's capital Lhasa were to commemorate the anniversary of the March 10, 1959 failed uprising against China's rule in Tibet, which ultimately led to the Dalai Lama's exile in Dharamsala, India. The protest turned violent March 14 when PRC security forces tried to disperse the people.
The Mainland Affairs Council stated that Beijing had obviously not made any progress in respecting human rights since the 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre. Calling China's actions in Tibet "barbaric," the MAC said that the recent human-rights abuses showed that China was not being a responsible stakeholder in the international community, but was a threat to regional peace instead.
China's promise to the world that it would respect freedom of speech ahead of the Olympics was a hoax, the council stated. The PRC's continuous use of military tactics to achieve its goals and consolidate its power should be enough to show people the world over that authorities in Beijing were unlikely to handle cross-strait issues in a peaceful manner, the MAC added.
In a show of solidarity, a number of Tibetans and Taiwanese people gathered to light candles that formed the words "Free Tibet" in a praying event at the Taiwan Democracy Memorial Hall March 17. In a joint statement, groups supporting the cause of a free Tibet said, "China claims Tibet is an integral part of China and Tibetan people are its subjects. Yet in reality, the PRC authorities crush defenseless people with tanks and soldiers, threatening the lives and safety of residents in Tibet."
Khedroob Thondup, a member of the Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile who divides his time between Taiwan and India, disputed the claim made by China that the Dalai Lama was behind the demonstrations in various regions of Tibet. "The protests have spilled beyond Lhasa and Tibet. Confrontations between monks and the security forces are also happening in China's Qinghai, Gansu and Sichuan provinces where there are Tibetan people and monasteries," he said March 17. The official pointed out that the escalation of the events clearly represented the Tibetan people's dissatisfaction with China's rule in Tibet, and that the protests could not have been orchestrated by the Dalai Lama.
As well as marking the anniversary of the 1959 uprising, a group of roughly 300 monks from Drepung Monastery on Lhasa's outskirts launched the initial demonstration to also seek for the release of fellow monks. They had reportedly been detained by the PRC government for celebrating the Dalai Lama's receipt of the U.S. Congressional Gold Medal in October 2007. "It was a glaring mistake on the part of the PRC authorities that they resorted to force again," Khedroob said.
In 1989, when PRC President Hu Jintao was secretary general of the Chinese Communist Party in Tibet, he quelled a movement for Tibetan independence with force and declared martial law in Lhasa, Khedroob recounted. According to the parliamentarian, that decision nearly 20 years ago heralded the crackdown on students in Beijing's Tiananmen Square three months later. "There is martial law again in Lhasa," he said.
As part of a team that entered into dialogue with China in 1980, Khedroob said that Hu should have known the situation in Tibet was gradually deteriorating. "Why would the monks want to rebel?" he asked. "They have been forced to receive 'patriotic education,' and they have been banned from possessing any images of His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Nearly half a century has passed and the Tibetans still want to rise up against China's rule. Decades of resentment have reached boiling point because the Tibetan people have had enough of being treated like animals rather than humans."
Khedroob added that incentives offered by the PRC government to the Han Chinese to immigrate westward, exacerbated by the completion of the direct Beijing to Lhasa rail link, was making Tibetans a minority in their own land. He was also pessimistic about China heeding any international calls for restraint because the CCP was only concerned about stamping out dissent in what it considered an internal matter.
"The protests in Tibet are a 'slap in the face' for China ahead of the Olympics, and the authorities will not let things go easily," he said.
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