Tag: violence

“I sympathise with the Tibetan cause. This is my way of standing by the people of Tibet and their struggle. I abhor violence in any form,” Bhutia told the Times of India newspaper.

link: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/sou…

Baichung Bhutia, an Indian footballer, is making headlines across Asia and the world by making this statement and refusing to carry the Olympic torch across India later this month.

This is the power of one.

Where governments fall short in decrying injustice, it remains for all of us, regardless of religion, or ethnicity, or politics, to stand up and let our voices be heard.

First, more news of international protests:

KATHMANDU, March 31 (Reuters) – Nepali police beat pro-Tibet protesters with sticks in Kathmandu on Monday and detained more than 100 people for demonstrating against China, police and witnesses said.

Hundreds of Tibetans split up into small groups and tried to storm a Chinese consular office from different directions in the Nepali capital.

snip

Police said at least 104 men and women were detained and would be freed later.

“They have been detained according to the government policy of not allowing demonstrations against China,” said Bibhutiraj Pandey, a police officer from the scene.

link: http://www.reuters.com/article…

In the midst of China’s carefully stage-managed PR tour with select western journalists, a small group of Tibetan monks seizes the moment:

The outburst by a group of 30 monks in red robes came as the journalists, including an Associated Press reporter, were being shown around the Jokhang Temple – one of Tibet’s holiest shrines – by government handlers in Lhasa.

“Tibet is not free! Tibet is not free!” yelled one young Buddhist monk, who started to cry.

snip

“They want us to crush the Dalai Lama and that is not right,” one monk said during the 15-minute outburst.

“This had nothing to do with the Dalai Lama,” said another.

link: http://ap.google.com/article/A…

From The Hindu:

“I have always made it clear that the expression of deep emotion should be in control. If it is out of control, we have no option. If the violent demonstration will continue, I would resign,” he told reporters here.

Disturbed by violent protests by Tibetans in various places, he asked the demonstrators to refrain from doing any harm to the Chinese people.

“I have always respected the Chinese people… Chinese communism. Even most of the Tibetan protesters are ideologically Communists. I think inside or outside China, if the demonstrators utilise violent methods, I am totally against it,” the Dalai Lama further said.

link: http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/…

I have lived through one city-wide riot in my life: Los Angeles, 1992. In Hollywood it wasn’t “ground zero”, but you could see the rioters coming, block by block, up the long, straight road known as Normandie Ave.

Just as unpredictable as a wild fire caused by flinging a lit cigarette out of a car window, riots like this are nimble, incendiary events, fueled by the anger and frustration of a community that has simply had enough. Masses of people don’t take to the streets, destroying everything in their line of site, and senselessly looting stores like Fredericks of Hollywood just to get that last, remaining fuscia-colored sized 42DDD bra and matching leopard print thong, without some reason other than a hankering for cheesy women’s lingerie (and yes, plenty of these items ended up in tag sales countless weekends after the riots ended).

Something bigger is always at work…

I love propaganda. I really do. Even in the darkest moments of human history propaganda can tend so far toward the ridiculous that it makes the cynic in me chortle with macabre laughter.

So, imagine my reaction running across this article on Xinhuanet.com (yes, at least my government doesn’t ban my access to their website. Yet.)

Follow me below the fold…

Speaking in Dharamsala, seat of Tibet’s government-in-exile, Ms Pelosi said: “We call upon the international community to have an independent outside investigation on accusations made by the Chinese government that His Holiness [the Dalai Lama] was the instigator of violence in Tibet.”

She added: “The situation in Tibet is a challenge to the conscience of the world.

“If freedom-loving people throughout the world do not speak out against China and the Chinese in Tibet, we have lost all moral authority to speak out on human rights.”

link: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asi…

…And Gordon Brown steps in to fill the Western void.

First, the footage. After this was aired on CTV in Canada and then picked up by other Western news outlets, China has formally admitted that the protests have spread outside Lhasa:

“If things become out of control then my only option is to completely resign,” Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader told a news conference in the north Indian town of Dharamsala, the seat of his government-in-exile.

“Even 1,000 Tibetans sacrificed their life, not much help,” he said. “Please help stop violence from Chinese side and also from Tibetan side.”

link: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/t…

From today’s Wapo – I’ve highlighted a chilling part of their report:

Vowing a harsh crackdown, Chinese police conducted house-to-house searches in central Lhasa Monday and rounded up hundreds of Tibetans suspected of participating in a deadly outburst of anti-Chinese violence, exile groups and residents reported.

The large-scale arrests and official promises of tough reprisals suggested the Chinese government has decided to move decisively to crush the protests despite calls for restraint from abroad and warnings that heavy-handed repression could taint next summer’s Olympic Games in Beijing.

The Tibetan regional governor, Champa Phuntsok, said detainees who show remorse and inform on others who were part of the week-long unrest would be rewarded with better treatment. But Buddhist monks and other Tibetans who participated in Friday’s torching of Chinese-owned shops and widespread attacks on Han Chinese businessmen would be “dealt with harshly,” he told a news conference in Beijing.

link: http://www.washingtonpost.com/…

The city is in complete shutdown. There is no atmosphere whatsoever on the streets because there is a curfew and the streets are totally deserted.

This evening we have heard a few sporadic blasts once every few hours.

Right now, I’m looking at buildings that are burnt out. The city is absolutely burnt to cinders. It’s trashed.

snip

Our current hostel is in a safe area, in a kind of ‘green zone’ as people are calling it. The worst of the violence was in the centre and east of the city.

Some tourists who were in the east were forcibly removed from their hotels and hostels. Police turned up today and tried to forcibly remove all of us to a hotel further out west.

snip

The electricity in our hostel is out even though all the buildings nearby have electricity. You sense that it might be because they know tourists with cameras and email accounts are here and could contact the outside world.

From an eyewitness account in Lhasa: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asi…