12 April 2008
Merkel adamant she would meet Dalai Lama again
(FASZ, Spiegel) In an interview in the German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung, German Chancellor Angela Merkel has made it clear that she would meet with the Dalai Lama again. She did not say when she would meet with him, but defended her reception of him in September 2007 at her office in Berlin. Her aides have said in the past that she would not be in Berlin for any meeting with the Dalai Lama when he visits Germany next month. The news magazine Der Spiegel said tension was growing over plans for him to meet the speaker of the lower house of the German parliament, Norbert Lammert, a Christian Democrat like Merkel. Der Spiegel said Beijing had applied pressure on Lammert to cancel the meeting, bringing a hardening of German-Chinese relations.
13 April 2008
Ambassador quits over Tibet remark
(PA) The Chinese Ambassador to Ireland walked out of the Irish Green Party conference after leader John Gormley condemned human rights abuses in Tibet. Liu Biwei stood up in protest while the Environment Minister delivered his keynote address live on TV. Mr Gormley said respect for human rights must extend to all cultures and countries. "One country which has been exploited and suppressed and suffered for far too long is Tibet", he said. "We have always enjoyed good relations with the Chinese people, but condemn this abuse of human rights and we call on the Chinese government to enter dialogue with the Dalai Lama". Gormley told the Irish Independent later that he would not be apologising for the remarks. Ireland's Foreign Minister Dermot Ahern described the incident as "overblown". Ahern also said the problem may have been that Gormley referred to Tibet as a "country", in what the foreign minister said was a "slip of the tongue". He said Gormley's call for dialogue reflects Irish government policy.
13 April 2008
China media slam Pelosi over Tibet
(Reuters) Xinhua has called Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the US House of Representatives "the least popular person in China" for her stance on Tibet in an editorial, and said the Beijing Olympic games would be a triumph of justice over evil. Beijing has gone on the offensive in the face of mounting international criticism of its handling of protests and riots in Tibet and the subsequent crackdown, which is clouding the run-up to the Beijing Olympic Games. Xinhua targeted Pelosi after she backed a resolution urging dialogue with the Dalai Lama, the end of a crackdown on nonviolent protesters and a halt to repression in the region. The People's Daily accused the California Democrat of cynical double standards and said she would likely top any Chinese poll to find "the most disgusting figure".
13 April 2008
Tibetan monks held over 'bomb plot'
(BBC) China has arrested nine Tibetan Buddhist monks who have been accused of a bomb attack, according to the reports by Xinhua. Chinese officials said the monks' homemade bomb exploded in a government building in eastern Tibet on 23 March. Xinhua did not explain why the alleged bomb incident was not reported at the time. Xinhua said the monks were from Tongxia monastery and had confessed to planting the explosive in Gyanbe township.
14 April 2008
Drepung monks detained during Patriotic Education campaign
(TCHRD) A number of monks from Drepung Monastery in Lhasa were detained by Chinese security on and around 12 April 2008 following the monks' protest against a Chinese ‘work team’ sent to the monastery to conduct ‘patriotic education’, according to information received by the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy (TCHRD). The Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) authorities sent the ‘Legal Information Education’ work team as a part of the patriotic education campaign at the monastery. However, the monks protested against the campaign. Later security forces were called into the monastery by the work team to control the protesting monks. A number of monks were immediately detained and taken away to an unknown location by the security forces. There is no information on the condition and whereabouts of those detained.
14 April 2008
TAR party chief praises security forces' role in recent unrest
(AP) Tibet Autonomous Region’s (TAR) Communist Party Secretary has praised the security forces' handling of recent unrest in the region, an official newspaper reports. Party and government officials, the military and police will form a "Great Wall of steel" against security threats, Zhang Qingli was quoted as saying by the Tibet Daily. Zhang made the comments during a meeting with the deputy commander and deputy political commissar of the People's Armed Police (PAP). Zhang reiterated claims that the protests were orchestrated by followers of the Dalai Lama, as part of a plot to destabilize the country, win Tibet's independence and sabotage the Beijing Olympics. Deputy PAP commander Lt. Gen. Huo Yi was quoted as thanking Zhang for his support and described the protests as "a type of exercise, a test and a chance to upgrade". Huo was shown in an accompanying photograph wearing combat fatigues and shaking Zhang's hand. The government says security forces responded to protesters with a high level of restraint, but has conceded units fired live ammunition at demonstrators outside Lhasa. Officials have refused to confirm any injuries or deaths.
14 April 2008
4,000 Tibetans protest in Kathmandu
(AP) About 4,000 Tibetans exiles took to the streets in Kathmandu, resuming demonstrations against the Chinese crackdown on rioting in Tibet, but this time Nepalese authorities did not intervene. The protest began as a silent march with demonstrators holding candles, but soon they began chanting anti-China slogans. Unlike at recent rallies, Nepalese police - who previously broke up demonstrations with bamboo baton charges and mass arrests - did not intervene at the demonstration. Nepal has been criticised by international rights groups and the UN for use of excessive force against the protesters. Nepal's government had said it would not allow any demonstrations against friendly nations, including China. Demonstrations were suspended for about a week before elections for a Constituent Assembly in Nepal.
14 April 2008
Dalai Lama fears more Chinese force
(AP) The Dalai Lama has said that Tibet cannot make any more concessions to China and renewed his calls for the government to cease suppression and withdraw troops. He once again denied Chinese claims that he has called for Tibet to be split from China and that he is behind recent turmoil, saying instead that he is committed to pursuing Tibet's right to autonomy. "The whole world knows that the Dalai Lama is not seeking independence, nor separation", he said at a news conference. "Our struggle is with a few in the leadership of the People’s Republic of China and not with the Chinese people", he said in a statement released after the news conference. "If the present situation in Tibet continues, I am very much concerned that the Chinese government will unleash more force and increase the suppression of Tibetan people". He said that if China stops such suppression and withdraw armed police and troops, he would advise all Tibetans to stop their protests. He also repeated his promise to resign should the violence in Tibet continue.
14 April 2008
President Sarkozy meets prominent Buddhist monk
The Elysee Palace has confirmed a meeting that took place between French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Matthieu Ricard, a prominent French Buddhist monk known for his role as the Dalai Lama's French translator. The meeting took place in order to discuss "a range of options". "The president was very concerned that a dialogue should be opened and that the question of Tibet be resolved in a satisfactory manner", Ricard said after the discussions. Ricard emphasised that he was not authorised to speak on behalf of the Dalai Lama but met with the President in order to "impartially and sincerely" review the situation in Tibet. Ricard also added that Sarkozy "put the focus on the credibility of the information coming out on behalf of the Tibetans".
15 April 2008
Solve Tibet issue peacefully - Japan PM
(AFP) Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda sent a message to Chinese President Hu Jintao asking him to resolve the Tibet issue through dialogue; a Japanese minister was quoted as saying. Environment Minister Ichiro Kamoshita told Japanese reporters in Beijing that he delivered the spoken message when he met Hu on the southern Chinese island of Hainan at the Boao Forum for Asia. "I delivered the message from the prime minister that encouraged China to improve the Tibet situation", Kamoshita told Japanese reporters. "The Japanese government has been telling China about the importance of dialogue", he said.
15 April 2008
Journalists group appeals to China for unrestricted coverage around Olympics
(AP) The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) appealed to Chinese authorities to stop what it called interference with news coverage leading up to the Beijing Olympics. The group said foreign journalists have been threatened for reporting on the disturbances during the torch relay around the world and the unrest in Tibet. 10 members of the IFJ began a four-day visit to China to make its case in person. The Brussels-based group is to meet with Chinese government and media officials as well as with foreign correspondents. The group said in a statement that some foreign journalists "have found themselves threatened in the wake of Chinese anger over foreign media coverage of disturbances in Tibet and the Olympic torch rally". "Our aim will be to get China to deliver on its promises of ending repression of journalists in the country and to open itself to independent media coverage around the Games". There was no immediate comment to the allegations by Beijing but in a recent statement, the government said it tries to protect the foreign press inside China.
15 April 2008
Geshe Sonam Phuntsok passes away in Kardze
(TCHRD) Geshe Sonam Phuntsok, a former political prisoner who spent five years in prison for his religious activities and for conducting a long life prayer ceremony for the Dalai Lama in October 1999, passed away on 05 April 2008 in Kardze after a prolonged battle with multiple illnesses. Geshe Sonam Phuntsok, popularly known as Kardze Geshe, was in poor health for the long period of time since his release from Chuandong no. 3 Prison in Tazhu county in October 2004. He was a hugely popular religious figure particularly in Kardze. Since his release in October 2004, he was put under virtual house arrest and, according to TCHRD, had to seek official permission even for medical treatment. His activities were under constant surveillance by the authorities.
16 April 2008
Jamyang Kyi arrested
(RFA) Chinese authorities in Tibet have arrested a prominent Tibetan writer, television producer, and performer. State security officers escorted Jamyang Kyi from her office at the state-owned Qinghai TV in Xining on 01 April, a source told Radio Free Asia’s (RFA) Tibetan service. Another source in Beijing said she had been arrested by the Xining Public Security Bureau, although the charges against her were unknown. "Security people went to Jamyang Kyi's house to search her computer, her mailing list, and contact numbers and took all these away", another source in Xining said. Jamyang Kyi has worked as a producer in the Tibetan-language section of state-run Qinghai TV for two decades. She is well known among Tibetans as an activist on women’s issues, and she went on a lecture tour through the United States in 2006. Her blog is popular among young Tibetans, although she stopped updating it several months before anti-Chinese protests erupted in Lhasa in mid-March.
16 April 2008
China upgrades Everest road ahead of Olympic torch
(AP) A blacktop road leading to the Mount Everest (Chin: Qomolangma) base camp was completed and will be used when the Olympic torch is taken to the peak, Xinhua reports. Workers spent 10 months widening the 67-mile road, evening the surface and installing guardrails at dangerous spots. "The upgraded highway ... will provide a safe path for drivers, tourists and mountaineers, and facilitate torchbearers [taking] the Olympic flame to the top of the world", the report said. Environmentalists have criticized blacktopping the road, which begins in Tingri town Shigatse prefecture, arguing it would damage the permafrost in the ecologically fragile area. Xinhua said the project did not damage the environment, citing the chief of administration for Mount Qomolangma State-Level Nature Reserve.
16 April 2008
China says explosives, weapons found in Tibetan monasteries
(VOA) Chinese authorities say they have found stashes of weapons and explosives at 11 Tibetan Buddhist monasteries in Gansu province. Gansu province's Kanlho (Chin: Gannan) TAP was the site of one of many anti-government protests that sprung up in the wake of China's crackdown on unrest in Tibet. China's official Xinhua news agency said police found bullets, guns, dynamite and satellite receivers during searches of the monasteries in Chone (Chin: Zhuoni) and Labrang (Chin: Xiahe) counties, and Tsoe (Chin: Hezuo) city. Over 100 monks are being held in Kanlho for their alleged involvement in violence there.
17 April 2008
Arrests in Qinghai
(RFA) Radio Free Asia reports that five Qinghai Tibetan community leaders have been arrested. All are residents of Machen (Chin:Maqin) county in Golok (Chin:Golog) prefecture, and all are now being held in the provincial capital, Xining. The five are Golog Dape, a popular comedian, leader of the Gangchen performance group, and animal rights activist; Dolma Kyi, a singer, activist, and founder of the folk-music company Gangchen Metok; Palchen Kyab, principal of the private Mayul Dargye school, founded with donations from Tibetan nomads; Lhundrup, Mayul Dargye’s assistant principal; and Sonam Dorje, a teacher. Golok prefecture State Security Bureau officers took the five into custody on 31 March and moved them to Xining. No information on charges against them was available. "No relatives have been allowed to visit them", one source in Qinghai said. Also in Qinghai, according to TCHRD, 100 people, including monks from the Rong Gonchen monastery, were arrested 17 April in Rebkong (Chin:Tongren) county.
17 April 2008
Taktsang Lhamo Kirti monastic school closed down
(TCHRD) In the aftermath of a series of Tibetan protests across the Ngaba (Chin: Aba) region in eastern Tibet, the Chinese authorities of Ngaba TAP have indefinitely closed down the school run by Taktsang Lhamo Kirti monastery in Dzoege (Chin: Ruo’ergai) county, Sichuan province, on 08 April 2008. According to TCHRD sources, the primary reason for its closure was cited as the participation by a number of students of the monastery in protests on 15 March, along with other senior monks of the monastery at Dzoege county headquarters. Students, both novice monks and children from surrounding areas, were known to have been sent back to their respective homes after the closure.
17 April 2008
China cancels 01 May plan to reopen Tibet
(AFP) Beijing has abandoned plans to reopen Tibet to visitors on 01 May, a tourism official has told AFP. Asked whether the reopening for foreign and domestic tourists had been postponed, a Tibet Tourism Bureau official told AFP by phone: "Yes, because conditions are not ripe for it". The man, who refused to give his name but said he was director of the bureau's main office in Lhasa, said a new date had not been set. Tour organisers had been informed of the postponement, a tour operator in Chengdu who regularly arranges trips to Tibet told AFP. Chinese authorities had announced on 03 April that the region would be reopened to foreign and domestic tourists on 01 May, a national holiday in China.
18 April 2008
Tibetans in India hold protests over Olympic torch relay
(Phayul) The Olympic torch relay in New Delhi saw the centre of the Indian capital emptied of people except for thousands of police. However, Tibetan exiles and their supporters across the country staged various protests and marches in their respective areas. In Bangalore, mock corpses were carried through the streets with protestors wearing the Olympic circles around their necks bound by chains. Some local politicians, supporters and Indian students from around the region, attended the protest. Mysore saw the presence of hundreds of monks at the town hall raising pro-Tibet slogans. People from surrounding constituencies of Hunsur, Kollegal and Chowkur gathered at Bylakuppe, the largest Tibetan settlement in India and burned Chinese goods. Over 30 Tibetans were arrested protesting outside the Chinese Embassy in Mumbai but police said they would be released without charge. There were also demonstrations in McleodGunj, Dharamsala, and activists from Darjeeling, Kalimpong, Gangtok, Ravangla, Sonada and Salugara assembled at Siliguri.
19 April 2008
EU Presidency has no current plans to invite Dalai Lama
(DWW) The EU's Slovenian presidency, through Slovenian Foreign Minister Dimitrij Rupel, told a special Chinese envoy in Ljubljana: "The Slovenian presidency did not intend to invite the Dalai Lama to the council meeting [of EU foreign ministers] in Brussels". The Slovenian presidency, however, added that "contacts with him [the Dalai Lama] on other levels were not excluded". French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner suggested on 01 April that the 27 EU foreign ministers might invite the Dalai Lama once a decision had been made by the Slovenian EU presidency.
21 April 2008
Dalai Lama honorary citizen of Paris
(AFP; Le Monde) The Council of Paris city voted in favour of a motion introduced by Bertrand Delanoe, the city’s mayor, to confer honorary citizenship to the Dalai Lama. The decision will "pay tribute to a champion of peace, a tireless advocate of dialogue between people", said Delanoe. "Paris also wants to show its support for the people of Tibet who are defending their most basic right to dignity, freedom and simply life", the mayor said in a previous statement. The Dalai Lama is scheduled to visit France in August 2008.
23 April 2008
Beijing criticises Dobriansky´s meeting with Dalai Lama
(Xinhua) Beijing has said US Under Secretary of State for Global Affairs Paula Dobriansky's weekend meeting with the Dalai Lama and her relevant remarks were extremely wrong and irresponsible, and an interference in China's domestic affairs. "The Under Secretary insisted to meet with the Dalai Lama regardless of China's firm opposition, and make irresponsible remarks on the Tibet affairs, which is entirely China's internal affairs [sic]", Foreign Ministry spokesperson Jiang Yu said. She said the US move has "grossly violated the basic principles of the international relations" and that China had made solemn representations to the US.
24 April 2008
China vows tough response to ‘rumour-mongering’
(Reuters) Chinese authorities will harshly deal with anyone who spreads rumours which "excite popular feelings" or disturb social harmony in the already restive region of Tibet, Beijing has said. The notice seems to be aimed at Tibetans who listen to foreign radio broadcasts, or skirt China's firewall to access overseas websites or exchange news with friends. "We will severely root out and give no indulgence to people with ulterior motives who spread rumours or excite popular feelings", the TAR government said in a statement on its website (www.xizang.gov.cn). Rumours which are "malicious and create serious consequences" will be "strictly dealt with in accordance with rules", it added, without elaborating. In the absence of uncontrolled media, rumours are often the main source of information in Tibet.
24 April 2008
Chinese spectators attacked Tibet protesters in Canberra
(Reuters) Mobs of Chinese supporters were accused of assaulting pro-Tibet campaigners on the sidelines of the Olympic torch relay in Australia as scuffles broke out and at least seven protesters were arrested. There was little of the disruption that marred the torch relay in London or Paris, and the Olympic flame travelled uninterrupted through Canberra, the capital. But observers said that behind the barricades Chinese nationals assaulted Tibetan activists and tore down their flags. Confrontations between an estimated 15,000 China supporters and about 3,000 pro-Tibet demonstrators reportedly flared all along the 16km route as the groups held aloft opposing banners and shouted competing slogans.
25 April 2008
Tibetans demand release of Panchen Lama
(Reuters) Thousands of Tibetan exiles in India marched in New Delhi to demand the release of Gedhun Choekyi Nyima, who was named by the Dalai Lama, as the 11th Panchen Lama. 25 April marked the 19th birthday of Gendun Choekyi Nyima who is believed to be under house arrest since he disappeared shortly after his recognition by the Dalai Lama. His whereabouts are unknown.
25 April 2008
Nepal torch security 'too harsh'
Ngawang Tenzin Jangpo, the abbot of Tengpoche Monastery in Nepal, told the BBC that the Nepalese government had gone too far in the precautions it was taking around the Olympic torch. Tengpoche Monastery, the main monastery of the Sherpa people, is situated in Solu Kumbhu district, next to the Tibetan border. Mountaineers and trekkers heading towards the Everest/Chomolangma pass the monastery and often get a blessing from the abbot before continuing their expedition. Nepal says it will use force to prevent anti-Beijing protests during the Olympic torch relay up Mount Everest in early May. Ngawang Tenzin Jangpo said the Everest region was a "zone of peace" and complained that "the home ministry has sent a huge number of army and police with guns and has also given them permission to open fire". Nepal has also brought in rules to stop summiteers carrying items such as cameras and electronic devices beyond base camp before 10 May. "I think it would be better that the United Nations should look after this issue, should monitor the Everest region, if there's any threat of shooting and disharmony" the abbot said.
25 April 2008
Sino-Tibetan talks to resume
(Xinhua; Tibet.net) The official news agency Xinhua announced that "In view of the requests repeatedly made by the Dalai side for resuming talks", "contact and consultation" between a representative of the Dalai Lama and "the relevant department of the central government" will take place "in the coming days". The Dalai Lama's spokesman, Tenzin Taklha, said of China's announcement: "Since His Holiness is committed to dialogue, we would welcome this". "We have to look at conditions they are talking about", he added.
