Tibet movement veers from 'middle way'
By Antoaneta Bezlova
BEIJING - Eight months after Tibet's capital of Lhasa was rocked by violent
anti-Chinese protests, positions have hardened, casting gloom on prospects for
a way out of the Tibetan stalemate.
Frustrated by the lack of progress during recent talks with Beijing, more than
500 Tibetan exile leaders have gathered in Dharamsala, India, for emergency
talks over their future strategy. The meeting, organized by the Dalai Lama, is
the first of its kind since the Tibetan government took refuge in India in
1959.
The Dalai Lama's admission of failure in his "middle way" approach - a policy
of compromise and peaceful dialogue that he
has pursued for years with Beijing - has led to calls by some radical young
followers to push for outright independence for Tibet by any means.
The prime minister of Tibet's government-in-exile said the talks this week
could lead to a dramatic new path for the Tibetan movement, if the congress
decides to drop the Dalai Lama's moderate path of compromise. The Dalai Lama
organized the six-day meeting, but it is unclear if he will attend as he is
recovering from gallstone surgery.
"If the outcome of the present meeting is we should switch over from the
'middle way' to independence, we will gladly follow that," Samdhong Rinpoche
said. He added the exiled Tibetan parliament would have the final say over any
decisions made this week.
Beijing has responded with a harsh warning, saying any attempt to split the
Himalayan region from China were "doomed".
"The so-called Tibet government-in-exile is not recognized by any government in
the world," China's foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang said at a press
briefing Tuesday. "Any attempt to separate Tibet from Chinese territory will be
doomed."
China's warning came on the heels of the British government's withdrawal of its
formal recognition of the suzerainty relationship between Tibet and China. As
the only remaining nation to accord Tibet a "special position", which
recognized China's "suzerainty" but not its "sovereignty" over Tibet, Britain
was accused by critics of undermining Tibet's bargaining position with Beijing.
China insists Tibet has been part of its territory for 700 years. But while the
Manchu dynasty - from the early 18th century on till 1912 - acted as a sort of
feudal overlord, providing military backing to protect the Dalai Lama whenever
necessary, the remote Himalayan region was left to govern itself.
In 1949, enforcing the Manchu claim to the territory, communist China invaded
and occupied Tibet. An uprising against Chinese rule in March 1959 was brutally
suppressed and the current Dalai Lama together with some 80,000 of his
followers fled to India where they set up the government-in-exile.
The Dalai Lama - revered by the Tibetans as a spiritual leader- won the 1989
Nobel Peace Prize for his determined commitment to non-violence in pursuing the
Tibetan cause.
He has repeatedly said he is not asking for a sovereign, independent Tibet, but
for genuine autonomy, which was pledged to his people by Chinese communist
leaders in 1951 but never delivered. Touring world capitals, he has emphasized
that without a greater respect for the religious and cultural identity of all
Tibetans living inside China, his homeland is doomed.
"Inside Tibet, the situation [has] become much worse," he told reporters
recently during a visit to Tokyo. "This old nation, with ancient culture and
heritage is now dying."
"I have to accept failure," he said.
A gulf of mistrust exists between Tibet and China, who have irreconcilable
visions of the future of the land of the snows. Representatives of the Dalai
Lama have held eight rounds of talks with Chinese negotiators since 2002
without any visible progress in breaching the differences.
The two sides cannot even agree which Tibet they are talking about. The Dalai
Lama believes he represents all seven million Tibetans, while the Chinese mean
the 2.8 million that live in the Tibet Autonomous Region. Most Tibetans live in
Sichuan, Yunnan, Gansu and Qinghai provinces as a result of borders drawn by
the Chinese communist leaders in the 1950s.
Beijing says the so-called 'Greater Tibet' put forward by the Dalai Lama would
take up a quarter of China's territory and denies it ever existed. It also
accuses the Tibetan spiritual leader of using the pursuit of "genuine autonomy"
as a disguise for seeking "covert independence". Chinese officials have
dismissed the current talks in Dharamsala as meaningless, contending the exiled
community does not represent the views of most Tibetans.
But a secret poll recently conducted among in Tibet found that most Tibetans
would follow any decision by the Dalai Lama, a spokesman for the exiled
parliament said this week. The number of those who wanted full independence was
twice as many as those who supported the current "middle way" approach, Karma
Chophel said, without revealing specifics as to how the poll was carried out.
The "middle way" has come under fire by some Tibetan exiles for not making
headway in pushing forward the Tibetan cause. Groups such as Gu Chu Sum,
Students for a Free Tibet and the influential Tibetan Youth Congress all favor
independence, but such a shift in policy would be of historic proportions and
could cost international support.
Tsewang Rigzin, leader of the Tibetan Youth Congress, told the Times newspaper
of London that Tibetans "will have to pay a price for confronting the Chinese
and they are prepared to pay it in their own blood".
In March, a violent uprising by ethnic Tibetans in Lhasa and across swaths of
western China was aggressively put down by Beijing. The riots threw a shadow
over China's preparations for the Beijing Olympics and provoked a string of
international protests.
Beijing blamed the Dalai Lama and his followers for the riots, at which Chinese
authorities have said 22 died. During the last round of talks held in the
Chinese capital this month the Tibetans presented a "memorandum on genuine
autonomy", which stressed their right to create their own regional government
and to be represented in decision-making in the Chinese government.
It also called for protecting the culture and identity of minority
nationalities in Tibet, and preserving the environment.
But Chinese officials accused the Tibetan envoys of "lacking sincerity" by
repeatedly demanding a "high degree of autonomy". They ended with Chinese
government officials reiterating that independence for Tibet can never be
considered.
Zhu Weiqun, vice minister of China's United Front Work Department, which
oversees Sino-Tibetan talks, said Beijing told the Dalai Lama in the 1980s that
a "high degree of autonomy" was impossible.
"However, more than two decades have passed, and they still use this trick to
talk in a roundabout way with the central government, which shows that they
lack sincerity," Zhu told the media at a specially convened briefing earlier
this month.
China has offered a wide degree of autonomy to the former colonies of Hong Kong
and Macao, but has said the same system will never be implemented in non-Han
Chinese territories.
"It is the fundamental political system of China to not allow the promotion of
ethnic separatism under the banner of genuine ethnic self-governance," Du
Qinglin, head of a government department in charge of the negotiations, said
after the breakup of the latest talks in Beijing.
"We will never allow someone to hold a banner of 'real autonomy' and damage
national unity," Du added.
But while Beijing sees the Tibetan impasse as an issue of sovereignty, the
exiled Tibetan community says it is an issue of human rights.
"This meeting is not about taking Tibet away from China," Thupten Samphel,
spokesman for the government-in-exile said Tuesday, referring to the current
talks in Dharamsala. "It is about restoring the human rights of Tibetan people
in Tibet."
Head
Office: Unit B, 16/F, Li Dong Building, No. 9 Li Yuen Street East,
Central, Hong Kong Thailand Bureau:
11/13 Petchkasem Road, Hua Hin, Prachuab Kirikhan, Thailand 77110
