Abuse, violence, and Tibet protests

Tibet’s arguments are given a sense of legitimacy by reports of Chinese abuse of Tibetans remaining in Tibet. Based on reports by independent journalists, peaceful dissent and protests are often met with harsh punishments meted out by the Han appointed officials. Accounts include jail, beatings, and myriad forms of torture. Though most reports are secondhand and so should be regarded with some skepticism, the accounts are simply too numerous to all be the invention of “violent Tibetan separatists” (Anonymous. “Commentary: Dalai Lama is spewing lies”. China Daily).

Protests can be assumed to have been taking place almost continuously after the Dalai Lama was forced to flee into exile in 1959, but several incidents have been especially publicized by the Western media. For example, in 2008 during the Beijing Olympics, Tibetan protests grew louder in the hopes that they would be heard with so much attention trained on China. Though beginning as peaceful protests on an unofficial annual Tibetan Uprising Day, the demonstrations ended up involving theft, burning, and violent rioting. This stretched Tibet-China relations almost to breaking point. Because PRC authorities would not allow the media into Tibet while the protests were happening, reports are mostly unofficial, but journalists that were able to get inside write that the violence was instigated by Tibetans who targeted Han Chinese and Hui Muslims.

The Chinese government accused the Dalai Lama of encouraging and possibly instigating the unrest. The Dalai Lama denied this, repeating his commitment to only peaceful protests and saying that the rioting was instead caused by widespread desperation and unhappiness.

Palden Choetso, 35, nun; self immolated on November 3rd, 2011." SFTHQ at flickr.com

Source: SFTHQ at flickr.com