China and Tibet
No middle way for China
Mar 10th 2009
From Economist.com
After 50 years in exile, the Dalai Lama seems close to despair
AP/Reuters
MARCH is the cruellest month in Tibet, breeding protests on the roof of the world, each of which in turn creates an anniversary to remember and mourn. As the Dalai Lama, Tibetans’ spiritual leader, put it in a speech on Tuesday March 10th in Dharamsala, his seat in exile in northern India, it is a time “to pay tribute and offer our prayers for all those who died, were tortured and suffered tremendous hardships…for the cause of Tibet”.
His speech included the offers of friendship and conciliation to China with which he usually tempers criticism of its rule. But much of it was angry and pessimistic in tone. It reads like the exasperated outpouring of a man despairing of the compromise he himself continues to promote. The Dalai Lama also reiterated the claim for an autonomous Tibetan homeland that extends beyond what China calls the Tibet Autonomous Region, into other parts of China.
In March 50 years ago an uprising against Chinese rule led to his flight into exile with tens of thousands of his followers. In 1989 commemorative protests in Lhasa were bloodily suppressed and martial law briefly declared. Last year saw an outbreak of vicious rioting in the Tibetan capital, directed at ethnic-Han Chinese and symbols of their commercial dominance（执政党绝对优势）.
The region is still suffering from the crackdown that ensued, in which, the Dalai Lama claimed, Tibetans “live in constant fear, and the Chinese authorities remain constantly suspicious of them…In short, the Tibetan people are regarded like criminals deserving to be put to death.”
The unusually harsh words from the Dalai Lama reflect both the bleakness of conditions in Tibet at the moment, and the poor prospects for political progress. Human Rights Watch, a monitoring and lobbying group, this week reported that there were thousands of arbitrary arrests after last year’s unrest and that hundreds of detainees remain unaccounted for.
To forestall protests during the anniversary season, the Chinese government has deployed a massive security presence both in the autonomous region and in the neighbouring provinces of Sichuan and Qinghai. Foreigners have been largely excluded from the region; the mobile-telephone network in Lhasa is undergoing “system maintenance”; and some websites have become inaccessible.
Exile groups have reported protests in some places, and in one part of Qinghai two small bombs damaged police vehicles. But the precautions are such that it seems unlikely that large-scale protests could erupt.
But those precautions themselves show how even the Chinese government realises the extent of Tibetan unhappiness with its rule. It continues to blame this on the influence of the Dalai Lama himself. It likes to harp on the feudal serfdom of historic Tibet, and is even marking March 28th as “Emancipation from Serfdom” day.
Yet the Dalai Lama has democratised his “government-in-exile”, and remains more moderate than many of his followers. Not only does he accept Chinese sovereignty, arguing instead for a “middle way” of genuine autonomy within China—a compromise he has repeatedly to defend from the criticism of more radical Tibetans that it is leading nowhere. Also, the Dalai Lama is unwavering in his opposition to violence.
Last year China did resume a sporadic and desultory dialogue with his representatives. They reported no hint of flexibility from China. China’s unspoken hope is presumably that with the passing of the Dalai Lama, who is 73, Tibetans will lose both their international figurehead and their internal unity. However, China will also lose perhaps its best and last hope of reconciliation with the Tibetan people it claims as its own. 作者: cjlu 时间: 2009-3-24 12:45:33
