Following Steven Spielberg’s withdrawal as an artistic adviser from the Beijing Olympics yesterday, China is now being pressurized by the international community to use its influence on ally Sudan to stop atrocities in the Darfur region. This August’s showpiece event is set to be overshadowed by China’s overall human rights records and Beijing’s alliance with Sudan that is behind the horrifying atrocities in Darfur. A letter of protest, organised by a group of Nobel laureates and international athletes, criticises the Chinese President Hu Jintao for providing unnecessary economical, political and military support to a government ‘that continues to carry out atrocities against its own people’. Many human rights activists have proposed a boycott of the Games, which to me is personally a bit too far ahead, yet, the 2008 Olympics should be used a background to highlight China’s complicity with a genocide that is unfolding in the deserts of Darfur. Sudan is an important trading partner for communist China, supplying arms and ammunitions and buying oil in return. Beijing has also threatened to veto United Nations security council resolutions imposing sanctions on Khartoum. Analysts feel any international arms and economic embargo on Sudan would be a setback for the Chinese economically as the Asian giant buys two-thirds of Sudanese oil exports mostly at highly subsidised rates.
Although China is not going to be bothered by this sort of intellectual protests, there is an indication that Beijing is concerned that the Games could be under threat from international activists who could politicise the planet’s most high-profile sporting event in August. To prevent any diplomatic mishandling, the Chinese government has appointed a special envoy to deal with Sudan and has, on occasions pressurised the Sudanese President Omar Al Bashir to accept an international peacekeeping force in the region. Darfur is not the only concern for Beijing. The preparation for the Olympics have already been hampered with some leading athletes and countries voicing their concerns about the quality of Beijing’s air pollution. But what could severely dent the mighty Asian nation’s reputation is a host of negative human rights records that the state is accused of. It is under fire over its imprisonment of dissidents, lawyers, journalists, excessive state control over the internet and persecution of unapproved religious groups. It remains to be seen what the diplomatic stance the Chinese take over a growing opposition to the Beijing’s role in Darfur and other controversial regional matters. But the world, no doubt, would want to see a successful Olympics in the Chinese capital and maybe the Games could bring a change of heart in Chinese diplomacy in the world. Source Link: The Independent Image Link: Beijing2008
Beijing Olympics under Darfur shadow
Taiwan’s presidential candidates want closer ties with China
With Taiwan going to the presidential polls on 22 March, it seems that who ever becomes the new President of Taiwan will soft peddle the issue of Taiwan’s separate identity from China. The controversy surrounding the political status of Taiwan depends on whether Taiwan should remain the effective territory of the Republic of China (ROC) or be absorbed by the People’s Republic of China (PRC) or become the Republic of Taiwan. The controversy over the political status of the Republic of China hinges on whether its existence as a state is legitimate and recognized. With the Republic of China being replaced by the People’s Republic of China in the United Nations in 1971, most of the sovereign states have switched their diplomatic relation to People’s Republic of China. The supporters of Taiwan independence say that PRC is the government of mainland China and Taiwan, not being a part of China will remain as the Republic of China (Taiwan) and will maintain its position as an independent autonomous government of Taiwan. In 1999, Taiwan President Lee Teng-hui proposed a two-state theory in which both the ROC and the PRC would acknowledge that they are two separate countries with special diplomatic, cultural and historic relationship and gained immense support from within Taiwan. This however, drew angry reactions from PRC who believed that Lee was covertly supporting independence of Taiwan. The present position of the majority of the Taiwanese is that they do not want any fresh confrontation with Mainland China. Ma Ying-jeou, the presidential candidate of Kuomintang, the party that governed Taiwan for 51years, is willing to improve ties with Beijing as earliest as possible. Compulsion of moving ahead the Taiwanese economy with Chinese help has made Ma explore possibilities of increasing the number of charter and commercial flights between Taiwan and Beijing. He also hopes to increase tourism and investment in Taiwan with help from Mainland China. Ma’s opponent Frank Hsieh, though not as liberal as Ma also wants closer economic cooperation with Beijing. What ever is the outcome of the Presidential election, the political and economic necessities will push Taiwan and Beijing closer. Source: IHT Image: Destination360
The heroism of those Tibetans who remain in Tibet
No one but a few high-profile celebrities and the Tibetans themselves are interested in Tibet. At least, that is how China would like us all to believe. Years after the Chinese Government forced the Dalai Lama to flee his homeland and take shelter in Dharamshala, India; nothing really has changed for the Tibetans. They are routinely tortured for their Buddhist Faith and a third degree genocide is on at Tibet. There are many ways to finish off a race. The method here is to flood Tibet with the Chinese to the extent that the native population just becomes too small to have any meaningful presence. Now again we are watching with bated breathe as Tibetan peace activists make the perilous journey home. They are marching from Dharamshala to Lhasa, the capital of Tibet. And as is to be expected the Chinese Government has banned the protesters from entering Tibet. Also is banned any remembrance of the 49th Anniversary of the suppression of Tibetans by the People’s Liberation Army. Yet, the UK Independent reports how all of Tibet and exiled Tibetans throughout the world have become publicly defiant. The Chinese, in short, are Tibetan all red in the face. The UK Independent reports the whole chain of events with a sort of characteristic Western gush we are so accustomed to when a person like Richard Gere discusses his own consternation at the failing of the Tibetan cause. This is all very well and is really grand of the First World to so care for the fallen of this wretched earth. But then, to focus on this, as mainstream media does, is to miss the main point. Even to carry on quoting the Dalai Lama ad infinitum is to miss the main issue here. The main issue here is that the Tibetans who stayed back in their own land are out on the streets of Lhasa and protesting their servitude at the hands of the Chinese. This, in spite of being kicked, abused, raped and burnt. It is easy to protest from outside one’s country and lament the despicable conditions of the motherland. But it is tough, sometimes to the point of absurdity, to protest while living under the oppressive regime. After so many years, the Tibetans in their homeland, who have no escape route or rather, who will not run away from Tibet, are vocal and filled with the fire of renewed protest. This is true rebellion: to annihilate the evil from within. There is only one problem; the Chinese are too technologically advanced and ruthless to allow any meaningful protest. Like the military junta in Burma, the Chinese are just biding their time to crush all protests in Tibet. There is none to prevent that because the world community will perversely continue to enjoy the spirit of the rebellion while the rebels die fighting. Tibet has no oil to bribe either the Americas or Europe. Source: UK Independent Image: Newsmax
Beijing flexes its military muscles to restore order in Tibet
These are hard times for the People’s Republic of China ahead of the 2008 Olympics in the summer. After days of violent protests in the streets of the Tibetan capital Lhasa, Beijing is moving towards a massive clean-up of the autonomous region to restore order. There is no doubt what would be China’s reaction to the protests. The Communist government is facing a severe public relations embarassment ahead of the Olympics and the world fears a repeat of the Tiananmen massacre inside Tibet to rein down on Buddhist protesters. China has accused the Dalai Lama of fuelling the violence when the exiled Buddhist spiritual leader termed Chinese rule in Tibet a ‘cultural genocide’. Beijing is sensitive about Tibet but there’s no denying the fact that the Communist leadership has made the matter far worse by denying the Tibetans democratic rights. Now as the deadline for Tibetan protesters to surrender is over, Chinese sucurity forces are clearing the troubled spots of independent witnesses so that reports of vicious Chinese crackdown on the rioters do not get through to the rest of the world. The violence in Lhasa took an ethnic turn when Tibetans attacked ethnic Han Chinese and Hui Muslims. Over the years Han and Hui Chinese have taken over the Tibetan economy depriving native Tibetans of a share in China’s economic boom. Political analysts have accused Beijing’s policy in Tibet as the direct result of the upsurge in ethnic violence. Tibet’s ancient religious and secular identity has been brutally subdued by Beijing over the years and it is of no surprise that the Tibetans chose a critical period to protest Chinese rule of the region. As of now the Beijing Olympics is under no threat of boycott given China’s influence in the world economy yet the riots would severely tarnish the country’s image of unity and stability and there would be calls from the democratic world for China to improve its human rights records. Unnamed Tibetans have accused the Chinese government of keeping a close eye on their daily movements and inside sources have provided evidence that Chinese troops are parading handcuffed protesters through the streets of Lhasa proving a brutal Chinese crackdown in Lhasa and its adjoining areas and provinces. It remains to be seen what China’s diplomatic response to the crackdown is but it cannot be denied that the events of the last week or so has put a severe dent on Beijing’s Olympics preparations and the age-old questions of Chinese human rights records are again on the forefront of Bejing’s Communist political system. Source: Independent
The benevolence of China in annexing Tibet
Parag Khanna is a good writer and like most writers she tends to be more of a disciple of fancy and imagination than of realities and solid historical research. She has set up a tenuous and theoretical parallel between the US and China. In the UK Guardian, Khanna asks the innocent question whether the US can ever think of allowing Texas or California to break away from the mother nation. The answer is of course in the negative. Such a thing can hardly be imagined, leave alone implemented. Such, we are told is the lot of China with reference to especially Tibet. Tibet, Khanna would have us believe, is as much coveted by China as Texas is loved by the greater Americas. This is good syllogistic logic but pathetically bad practice of social scientific tenets and false retrojections into history. A cursory glance into Texan history will tell us that there were large number of Texans who wanted to be part of the United States of America and not joining either Mexico or being an Independent State. Tibetans, on the other hand, have always been eager to remain independent and neither be part of China or even be a prefecture of China even as the Dalai Lama feebly gives in to Tibetan demands. Khanna subtly avoids mentioning even in passing the great cultural and spiritual heritage that Tibet is heir to. This is done also by first comparing Tibet to Texas et al, then with the Muslim Uighur separatists ruled Xinjiang province in China. Texas is oil rich and thus attractive to the US. Xinjiang and Tibet are both rich in uranium, gold and timber. The Chinese simply want that. This is the truth but for an outsider to writer of Tibet without referring at all to any of its cultural glory shows that the writer’s sympathy lies with atheistic China. In fact the latter portion of the report reads like a veritable raison d’être about why Tibet should not gladly be part of China. Khanna lets us know of the great improvements that Tibetan life will have if only Tibet accepts Chinese hegemony. Education for all, better communication, both physical and wireless, a stronger economy and the list goes on. The Dalai Lama would do well to read this article for the former is slowly conceding defeat in the face of Chinese tyranny. But the moot question for us reading Parag Khanna is how the work has been published by the Western media and the writer’s forthcoming book is on its way to Western academia. In the name of research and historiography, Khanna’s writings will further isolate the Tibetans and make them vassals of the Han Chinese. People will increasingly believe in the benevolent attitude of China and one day we will all shout for joy at China’s annexation of Tibet. Source: UK Guardian Image: Destination 360
After Tibetans, Uighurs too turn restive in China
One of the reasons why China is panicking over the Tibetan independence ‘genie’ popping up again is that it has over the years kept many such genies captured in bottles. The Uighurs Muslims in Xingjiang province is another restive group in the country. They are quite numerous; they number 8 million among a population of 19 million in the province. The Tibetan unrest seems to be fanning their sense of resentment against the Chinese rule. Many have come out on the roads to protest. The Uighurs is a discontented lot. They feel (and rightly so) that their religious rights are being trampled upon. The violent elements in the community have joined Al Qaeda and Taliban in Pakistan and Afghanistan. This has alarmed China. In an interesting aside, many Uighur Muslim fighters who were captured by US forces in Afghanistan and sent to Guantanamo Bay, have finally landed up in Albania. The US did not want to send them back to China as they would be tortured. The Uighurs want to break free from China. This separatist tendency coupled with their Islamist zeal and their association with Al Qaeda is giving top Chinese leaders sleepless nights. What they want last is a clash between Islam and their communist-capitalist ideology. In Pakistan resentment against China is increasing by the day. The impetus for the hatred is the bad treatment Uighur Muslims are receiving in Xingjiang province of China. Chinese nationals are being targeted. The kidnapping of Chinese girls from a massage parlour a few months ago was one of the stimulus that made Musharraf act against the Red Mosque. Via: Timesonline
Fate of Tibet victims: How riots made their lives miserable
The Tibetan riots have been a miserable experience for those who have been deeply hurt and injured by the way they were treated by Chinese authorities. Women who expressed their sentiments in the rallies against China, along with the monks, have been victimized by cruelty and curtailment of their freedom of expression. Riots in Tibet during the March 14 incident were a nightmare and no one could have ever thought these will be as bloody as ever. These incidents were certainly a devastating experience for the families of the five women who were burned to death in a nearby clothing store where the riots occurred. The turn of events was like filming a movie that you wouldn’t want to happen in real life. Up to this day, the Dalai Lama is suspected to be the mastermind of the Tibetan riots as Meng Jianzhu, head of the Ministry of Public Security, visited the burned store and delivered the message of the government. But I believe this is pure allegation and no evidence has been gathered to prove this hearsay as true. What Beijing has not realized is that these incidents are a big blow on the head of Chinese authorities and only validate their countless violations to the powerless Tibetans. Tibet is a small country and yet China used its full-throttled cruelty to stop any riots against the superpower nation. I am very sure the setbacks as the Beijing Olympics nears are greater than expected because of this. Herald Tribune
China’s Tibet nightmare is over for now
The Tibet protests had initially unnerved the Chinese government. With the Beijing Olympics just a few months away, it could not throw in battalions of PLA soldiers with orders to crush the rebellion brutally. Instead, it is dealing with the rebellion of army soldiers disguised as policemen. The idea is to show the world that this is an internal security matter, needing only police action; no need for the army. These furtive measures along with brusque warnings to major powers to stay off Tibet have worked. The blunt talking has worked not only because China is a military power, but also because it’s economic clout is enormous. India is leaving no stone unturned to ensure that China is not the least offended. US president Bush has said he will go to the opening ceremony of the Olympics as a ‘sports lover’. This fools no one. Everyone is looking the other way. Tibetans are alone, except for shrill but futile noises from human rights organizations. All this has emboldened China. It has beefed up security in the troubled province. The dirty tricks department of the Chinese government has let loose rumours that some Tibetans have ganged up with Al Qaeda elements amongst Muslim Uighurs. This is like finishing off a job well done (of subduing the protest). The Tibetans can do nothing but smoulder in anger in their hearts. The more practical ones, who see only the economic benefits of being a part of a rapidly growing country, have actually denounced the Tibetan uprising. It seems the Chinese economic success story is dousing the flames of the cry for Tibetan independence. Image credit Washington Post
Rising human rights violation in China on the eve of the Olympics
As people from every corner of the globe are preparing themselves to be a part of the 2008 Beijing Olympics to be held in August this year amidst the slogan – One World, One Dream, some dissidents are urging the global community to boycott this year’s summer Olympics in protest against Chinese atrocities in Tibet. The French President Nicolas Sarkozy is contemplating boycott of the opening ceremony that would be attended by a number of prominent world leaders. However, the overwhelming majority are not considering boycott of the games as a fitting retribution to China for its unending human rights violation. Although, the protests by the Tibetans have grabbed international headlines in the past few weeks but the tyranny of the communist government of China is not concentrated only in Tibet, but human rights violation has increased manifold in the Mainland on the eve of the Olympics. As soon as one arrives in Beijing for the Olympics, they would be dazzled by the architectural marvels of the city – its skyscrapers, its spacious streets, its modern stadium and its happy inhabitants. Hidden underneath the glitter of wealth and splendour is a different China – a country without freedom of expression, without political freedom, without religious freedom and without any human rights. There is no transparency in the funding of the huge Olympic projects. There had been complaints of large-scale embezzlement of taxpayers’ money and the deputy mayor of Beijing formerly in charge of Olympics construction had been arrested on corruption charges. To clear spaces for construction thousands of civilian houses have been demolished without properly compensating their owners. Two brothers, Ye Guozhu and Ye Guoqiang, had been imprisoned and tortured for filing a legal appeal after their house was forcefully demolished. By the end of 2007, around 1.5 million people were forced to evacuate the cities to facilitate the Olympics construction. Without any formal resettlement schemes, these people are expected to suffer untold misery. To keep the cities clear of beggars, homeless and vendors, these people have been detained in shelters or labor camps. The Chinese government is not supporting any kind of petition against their demolition drives. On August 5, 2007, 200 petitioners had been arrested in Beijing. In January 2007, a petitioner Duan Huimin was killed by Shanghai police and in July last year another petitioner Chen Xiaoming died under mysterious circumstances during a lengthy detention period. In continuing with its efforts to stifle the voice of popular resentment, China is continuing with its literary inquisition. 35 Chinese journalists and 51 writers are still languishing in the Chinese prisons. Over 90 percents of the arrests had taken place after China’s successful bid for the Olympics in July 2001. The 2007 Ramon Magsaysay Award winner, the blind activist Chen Guangcheng is serving his four years prison term for exposing the truth about forced abortion and sterilization. There is no freedom of expression, countless websites have been closed, blogs deleted, and Chinese interviewees had been tortured and arrested for speaking to the foreign media. The above incidents had been chronicled by Chinese human rights activists Hu Jia and Teng Biao. For publishing an open letter highlighting the atrocities of the Chinese government, Hu Jia has been sentenced to 3 ½ years imprisonment this week. Source:Washington Post Image
Chinese arms will only add fuel to raging Zimbabwe political fire
The crisis in Zimbabwe is deepening. The Mugabe governemnt is not allowing the declaration of presidential election results because it is rumoured that he is trailing behind MDC leader, Tsvangirai. What is adding fuel to the fire is that China has send a shipload of arms to the troubled country. The ship lies at the South african port of Durban. The port workers are refusing to unload the arms from the ship and put them on trucks going to Zimbabwe. But Thabo Mbeki’s government has no such qualms. It says South Africa does not interfere in dealings between two nations (Zimbabwe and China). But what he does not say is that the arms will be used to suppress opposition workers by the Mugabe government. It will only lead to more violence. Mbeki has failed as the mediator in the election crisis. He has acted pro-Mugabe by preventing Zimbabwe from being put on the UN Security Council agenda. South Africa is the present president of the UNSC. By not stopping the Chinese arms he has only shown his bias further. But though Mbeki’s reverence towards Mugabe is laudable, it is only pushing Zimbabwe towards a big crisis. The stubborn Mugabe regime has now labeled MDC leader, Tsvangirai, as a traitor for begging Gordon Brown to step in to help him, which is untrue. As treason in Zimababwe is punishable by death, this seems another ruse by the regime to get rid of its chief political opponent. Mugabe by digging his heels in, is closing all doors for a honourable exit for himself. As Tsvangirai says, The more he is digging in, the more he’s abusing people. I still think we should forgive and forget. But given the wave of violence against the people, how do you sell that to the people?Tsvangirai is being hospitable towards Mugabe, not out of any altruism, but because he fears the President and his associates would simply cling to power all the harder if they face being tried for human rights abuses. Sources: Guardian, Independent