TIBET - CHINA TALKS END WITH CHINESE RECRIMINATIONS

Security guards outside the Shen Zhen Kylin Villa, venue for the Tibet - China talks, on May 4, 2008 Photo: AP / Kin Cheung

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hina's state-run media on Sunday claimed new obstacles to communication with Tibetan representatives, but said that both sides have agreed to a second round of talks -- leaving it a mystery as to whether current discussions would extend beyond the few hours of meeting yesterday.

The Xinhua report late Sunday said that Chinese officials had answered questions raised by the Dalai Lama's envoys at the meeting in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen.

"The two sides agreed another round of contact would be held at an appropriate time," Xinhua said, citing the unidentified sources.

The Chinese side continues to refer to their dialogue partners as "the Dalai side," with Xinhua quoting their negotiators (both are vice-ministers of the Communist Party's "United Front Work Department") as saying the government displayed "great patience and sincerity" in arranging the meeting "at the repeated requests made by the Dalai side." For Tibetans, this is a most disrespectful way of talking about him, almost as grating as "the Dalai clique."

Even as the talks were taking place, China maintained its constant verbal attacks.

Xinhua quoted Chinese experts on Tibet as saying the Tibetan Youth Congress, an exile group, was dedicated to separating Tibet from China and was the "armed spearhead of the 14th Dalai Lama group."

It quoted a researcher from the Beijing-based China Tibetology Research Center as saying the Tibetan Youth Congress was behind the March 14 riots.

"We hope the 14th Dalai Lama could truly give up 'Tibet independence,' stop secessionist activities, stop instigating violence, stop disrupting the Beijing Olympics, effectively prevent TYC's violence and denounce its terrorist acts," Xinhua quoted Liu Hongji as saying.

Now there's CCP "sincerity" for you (but at least he didn't just call him "the Dalai" again). Demand that he stop doing what he isn't doing in the first place, demand that he stop other people from doing what they aren't doing either, and throw a bucket-load of red herrings into the mix for good measure.

President Hu Jintao, who himself supervised (from a distance) the suppression of Tibetans two decades ago when he was Party boss of the "TAR", made clear that China would not be taking the words of the Tibetan envoys at face value (which would seem to be a requirement for a genuine dialogue partner), but will maintain its attitude of deep, abiding mistrust. "We need to look out for not only what they would say but also what they would do," Hu said before the meeting even began.

The problem is, they assume Dalai Lama's malicious intent no matter what he does or says, and they seem locked into believing only what their conspiracy-minded ideologues suspect he's secretly up to. Any conciliatory words or deeds on his part will always be insufficient to dispel the paranoia. And paranoia is a heavily ingrained Communist Party value, applied equally to freedom-loving Tibetans as to freedom-loving people of other countries ("anti-China forces").

A Tibetan spokesman yesterday indicated their belief that the talks would continue for two or three days.

"It will continue tomorrow and possibly the day after ... We are expecting them back on the 7th or 8th (of May)," Tenzin Taklha, a senior aide to the Dalai Lama, told Reuters on Sunday.

"We hope the Chinese are serious about the talks ... hopeful that the Chinese are willing to look into the problems in Tibet."

But the report on the Times of India says the talks have ended abruptly after failing to stretch beyond a couple of hours. The Chinese statement about a "second round" at an "appropriate time" does not sound like anything will be going on in Shenzhen today.

Could an "appropriate time" be after the Olympics are over -- trusting that their charade will get the international criticism to stop for now? The Tibetans were far more diplomatically inclined, saying at the outset that they would have no comments on the discussions until after they have briefed the Tibetan government on their return to India. The heavy security at the state guest house venue has already been lifted, so it seems like that is all until a later time becomes as "appropriate" as the present.

Meanwhile, "patriotic" re-education continues apace in Tibet with brutal punishments for those who refuse to conform.

China's charade puts on display the difficulties any country will encounter in dealing with this new "peacefully rising power." As if the torch relay fiascos in so many countries weren't enough to reveal the CCP's true face, especially to China's regional neighbours.

The "Harmonious Journey" of China's flame (it's not the IOC's flame any more) across Asia, where Chinese leaders would have expected to cement their country's status as the "elder brother," turned into a high security nightmare for the hosting countries where aggressively patriotic and often violent mobs were organised to confront legitimate protest of China's anti-human rights practices, and raised instead the spectre of Chinese chauvinism more than a picture of a "peacefully rising power."

The distinguished foreign affairs columnist Brahma Chellaney wrote in the The Times of India that this was a publicity stunt which "will only infuse more politics into the games already tainted by the manner China’s pressure helped turn the just-concluded international torch relay into a stage-managed security exercise everywhere to pander to its self-esteem at the cost of the Olympic spirit of openness."

The true Olympic spirit was not much on display; the expectation that others should "pander to its self-esteem" certainly was. There's nothing more political than that.

Well, well. Look what just came in before I could even get this posted.

"Following the March 14 incident in Lhasa, the Dalai has not only refused to admit his monstrous crimes, but he has continued to perpetuate fraud," an article in Monday's Tibet Daily said.

The article, which did not refer to Sunday's talks, described the Dalai Lama's demands for "genuine autonomy" in Tibet and the "greater Tibetan region" as fraudulent.

The "Dalai Clique" is trying to "confuse public opinion and incite ethnic hatred," the article said. The Dalai Lama's attempt to realise a "greater Tibetan region, is part of his attempt to split the motherland," it said...

In a separate article, the paper also denounced efforts by Western nations to use the "Tibet issue" to interfere in China's internal affairs and maintained that such efforts were "doomed to failure."

Meanwhile Rebiya Kadeer, the successful Uighur businesswoman who spent six years in a Chinese jail and now lives in exile, says the flaming route of torchy harmony through the "Xinjiang" region (northwest of Tibet) is worsening Chinese repression there and should be cancelled.

"The Chinese authorities have been heavily cracking down on the Uighurs in order to bring the torch through East Turkestan," Kadeer said, using the Uighur term for the region.

"We have learned that many Uighurs are being detained and arrested by the Chinese authorities to prevent their peaceful protests in relation to the torch," she told AFP in an e-mailed answer to queries.

Another Uighur exiled leader said on Saturday that more than 10,000 people had been rounded up in the past few months.

"Everywhere, homes, hotels are searched. People are arrested," Dolkun Isa, secretary general of the Munich-based World Uighur Congress, told AFP in Tokyo.

"Even people with no past records have been arrested simply because they look suspicious."

Her Flaming Harmoniousness is slated to proceed through the Uighur region immediately after she finishes with Tibet in late June.
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Labels: China, Tibet

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