Beijing Enforces Rule : Tibet--Old China Ties Still Chafe

Dominating the inner shrine of Lhasa’s Jokhang Temple, Tibet’s holiest religious site and the focal point of recent anti-Chinese rioting, is a gold Buddha brought to Tibet by a Chinese princess 1,350 years ago.

The imposing jewel-encrusted image was part of the dowry of the Tang Dynasty princess Wen Cheng, who was sent to marry Songtsen Gampo, the warrior king who first unified Tibet.

Wen Cheng and her Buddha, having once played a major role in the development of Tibetan culture, now help China to justify its rule of Tibet.

To the protesters who have staged three demonstrations since Sept. 27--including one on Oct. 1 that touched off rioting in which at least six people died--the Chinese are arrogant colonizers who seek to destroy Tibetan religion and culture.

Dream of Independence

The demonstrators dream of making Tibet independent again, as it was from the 1911 overthrow of China’s Qing Dynasty until Communist Chinese troops marched into Tibet in 1950.

But virtually all ethnic Chinese look on Tibet as an integral part of China. They contend that cultural ties date from Wen Cheng’s 7th-Century marriage and that political unity was established with the 13th-Century Mongol conquest of both China and Tibet.

After the decline of the Mongols and a long period of Tibetan independence, the Qing Dynasty reconquered Tibet in 1720, laying the modern basis for China’s claim to sovereignty over the region. With the exception of Outer Mongolia (which was part of the Qing empire but is now an independent country--Mongolia--closely aligned with the Soviet Union), China’s current boundaries closely approximate those of that period.

Viewed as Traitors

The Chinese, by their actions in Tibet, see themselves as defending the unity and security of their nation and helping free the Tibetan people from poverty and superstition. In this view, which is shared by ordinary Chinese and top leaders, advocates of Tibetan independence are traitors.

The feelings of ethnic Chinese are amplified by a decades-old fear that an independent Tibet might allow India or the Soviet Union to station troops on its territory, which could bring enemy soldiers to the heights above central China.

These two self-righteously opposing views of Tibet’s history and its place in the modern world add much bitterness to the continuing confrontation in Lhasa.

Chinese authorities have expelled foreign journalists from Tibet, restricted entry of foreign tourists to those who are on package tours and ordered all those who participated in the bloody Oct. 1 riot to turn themselves in to the police by today.

Leniency was promised for those who met the deadline, with the prospect of harsh punishment for those who do not.

These steps, according to Tibetans who spoke with Western reporters last week, have led to widespread fears in Lhasa that an even more severe crackdown may come soon.

At least three factors apparently combined to spark the recent protests: a visit to Washington last month by Tibet’s exiled theocratic ruler, the Dalai Lama; a mass rally in Lhasa at which two Tibetans were ordered executed and others were given long prison terms, and the occurrence of what monks considered supernatural omens, including an earthquake and a rainbow.

The Dalai Lama spoke Sept. 21 to the U.S. Congress’ Human Rights Caucus, outlining a five-point proposal for Tibet’s future. His proposal called for a halt in the movement of ethnic Chinese into Tibet, respect for human rights and the freedoms of Tibetans, a stop to what he said is the production of nuclear weapons in Tibet, the establishment of Tibet as a demilitarized zone of “peace and nonviolence” and negotiations on Tibet’s future status.

News of the Dalai Lama’s statement quickly circulated among monks in Tibet.

Then on Sept. 24, according to an official Chinese radio report, a mass rally attended by 15,000 people was held in Lhasa, at which death sentences were pronounced against two Tibetans who the Chinese said were murderers. At least one of the men was executed immediately.

The rally audience, according to some reports out of Tibet, was told that “certain elements” were trying to split the unity of the motherland and would be punished.

Spokesmen for the Dalai Lama in the United States said the two men given death sentences were political prisoners.

China responded with indignation to that charge.

But one of the other Tibetans sentenced at the rally, identified as Longga, was described in the Chinese radio broadcast as a “traitor.” The report said he had committed manslaughter and was sentenced to an indefinite prison term.

Later, after the Oct. 1 incident, Western tourists coming from Lhasa told reporters in Katmandu, Nepal, that rumors of torture and impending executions had fanned the anger of rioters.

The day after the sentencing rally, “a giant rainbow arched itself above Drepung (monastery),” according to a monk who spoke with Western reporters in Lhasa. A day later, there was a minor earthquake. Both were interpreted as auspicious omens.

“The people knew they had the blessing of the Dalai Lama,” the monk said.

The next day, Sept. 27, at least 26 monks, most of them from Drepung, marched around the Jokhang Temple, carrying the outlawed Tibetan flag and shouting independence slogans. Police arrested the demonstrators.

That rally inspired a bigger protest on Oct. 1. But this time, when the police arrested the monks, an estimated 2,000 bystanders rioted. They stoned the police, set fire to police vehicles and broke into, and then burned down, the police substation where the monks were being held.

Between seven and 14 people, including at least three monks, are believed to have died. Official Chinese statements have said that six people died.

Uncertainty over the death toll arises in part because Chinese officials have issued conflicting statements over whether the six deaths mentioned in the Chinese media were of policemen. Western bystanders have reported that at least seven or eight Tibetans died.

China’s media have reported that the police obeyed orders not to fire their weapons. But Western tourists who witnessed the incident told reporters that police, although restrained at first, eventually responded with gunfire.

On Oct. 6, in the last major incident, about 90 still-defiant protesters marched to the regional government office, demanding the release of those arrested earlier. There, some were beaten by police, according to Western witnesses, and all were arrested.

An official Chinese radio report the next day said that all 90 were released that same evening because “they were not involved in beating, smashing and looting and admitted their mistakes.” At least 30 Tibetan monks, however, remained in custody as of last weekend, according to Western reports coming from Lhasa. They face interrogation and an uncertain fate.

An Oct. 10 report by the New China News Agency said that “many lamas (monks) and people who participated in the riot . . . have confessed their unlawful activities and exposed those of others.”

“Nineteen lamas from the Sera Monastery have confessed their unlawful activities on Oct. 1 and some have started to see their mistakes,” the report said.

The agency said that “many Tibetans expressed indignation over the riot, which was staged in response to splittist activities fostered by the Dalai (Lama) clique abroad, calling for punishment of the leading rioters.” In recent years, Western visitors to Lhasa have often reported being asked by Tibetans for pictures of the Dalai Lama. The recent demonstrations provide further evidence of his continued importance to Tibet and its 2 million inhabitants--96% of them Tibetans and the rest Han Chinese--according to Beijing.

In an Oct. 7 press conference at the Tibetan exile center in Dharmsala, India, the Dalai Lama, 52, said that he endorsed independence demonstrations, but called for them to be conducted “in a peaceful manner.”

“I do not want to discourage the Tibetan people’s determination for independence,” he said.

But the Dalai Lama, who lived in Lhasa for several years under Chinese rule before fleeing to India in 1959 after an abortive anti-Chinese rebellion, also indicated that something less than independence might be sufficient to protect the rights of the Tibetan people.

“Some sort of special relationship” with Beijing might be possible, he said. “We have every right to want independence. But be realistic. See other possibilities.”

China’s Offer to Taiwan

China is scheduled to regain sovereignty over the British colony of Hong Kong in 1997 under a formula of “one country, two systems” that would allow it to remain capitalist. Beijing has offered essentially the same proposal to Taiwan. The Dalai Lama has sometimes appeared to be seeking similar autonomy for Tibet.

All of this adds one more political challenge to China’s top leaders as they gather in Beijing later this month for a Communist Party congress.

Diplomats in Beijing have said that the Tibetan incidents appear to provide ammunition for hard-liners opposed to relaxation of central ideological and economic controls.

At the beginning of this year, hard-line conservative leaders, riding a backlash against pro-democracy student demonstrations, were able to oust reformist party General Secretary Hu Yaobang and launch an ideological attack on “bourgeois liberalization,” a code word for Western democratic and capitalist influences.

Hard-liners could seek to strengthen their position at the Oct. 25 party congress by blaming the demonstrations and rioting on the relative tolerance shown to religion by reformist leaders since 1979 and on the new openness that allowed hundreds of foreign tourists to witness what happened in Tibet.

Acting General Secretary Zhao Ziyang, Deputy Premier Wan Li and Politburo member Hu Qili, three top reformist leaders, have all been associated with the more relaxed policy toward Tibet and could be blamed for creating conditions that contributed to the unrest.

But the Chinese media and top officials, including Zhao and China’s paramount leader, Deng Xiaoping, have continued to stress that the party congress will push forward China’s policies of openness and market-oriented economic reform.

And the spectacle of blood in the streets of Lhasa, monks under arrest and the most troublesome foreign witnesses sent away can be depicted as a reaffirmation of Beijing’s toughness. The message from the capital seems to be that Tibetans may be offered limited religious freedom, but any attempts to win independence will be crushed.