Tibet monks disrupt tour by journalists

[maddezmom]

Source: AP

LHASA, China - A group of monks shouting there was no religious freedom disrupted a carefully orchestrated visit for foreign reporters to Tibet's capital Thursday, an embarrassment for China as it tried to show Lhasa was calm following deadly anti-government riots.

A Foreign Ministry spokesman later insisted that Tibetans had full rights and warned Europe not to interfere. Meanwhile, the Dalai Lama, the region's exiled spiritual leader, said he was in touch with "friends" about pursuing a dialogue with China, adding that Chinese authorities "must accept reality."

Officials arranged the trip for the reporters to showcase that Lhasa was at peace after the mid-March violence and a subsequent government crackdown shattered China's plans for a smooth run-up to the Beijing Olympics.

The outburst by a group of 30 monks in red robes came as the journalists, including an Associated Press reporter, were being shown around the Jokhang Temple — one of Tibet's holiest shrines — by government handlers in Lhasa.



Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080327/ap_on_re_as/china_tibet;_

[Speciesamused]

1. They are trying to save their people. Goodness at its best.

[David__77]

2. Not sure what I think.

There's no doubt that the average Tibetan person is much, much better off materially than 50 years ago. Slavery was abolished, and livings standards have risen dramatically by all accounts. The one-child rule does not apply there, and the whole economy is subsidized by the central government. On the other hand, I believe in self-determination. It's just iffy to me whether or not that applies here.

[Xithras]

3. But that's pretty much true globally.

In most of the world, people live better today than they did 50 years ago. That's simply the march of progress. By the standards of that era, the people of Tibet really didn't live any differently than the people of India, or China for that matter.

You should read up on the current forced relocations in Tibet today. The Chinese government wants to get rid of the remote villages, and so is building new towns along their new highways. They are then forcing the Tibetan residents in these remote areas out of their ancestral villages, levelling them, and are forcing them into these new towns. Some of the farming oriented Tibetans like it because they're getting more modern homes without a big lifestyle change, but the herders are being forced off their rangeland and typically find themselves poverty stricken and unemployed because their skills aren't applicable in the new towns. If they resist, the Army comes in and moves them at gunpoint.

[Joanne98]

4. Lhasa monks accuse China of lying over unrest

Source: Reuters

Tibetan monks stormed a news briefing at a temple in Lhasa on Thursday, accusing officials of lying about unrest and embarrassing Chinese authorities during a stage-managed tour by foreign reporters.

Authorities say calm has been restored since an anti-Chinese uprising erupted in the Tibetan capital two weeks ago. China says its security forces acted with restraint and that 19 people died at the hands of Tibetan mobs during the unrest.

But the Tibetan government-in-exile says 140 died in Lhasa and elsewhere, most of them Tibetan victims of security forces, arousing international protest soon before the Beijing Olympics.

On Thursday young monks at the Jokhang Temple, one of the most sacred in Tibet, stormed into a briefing by a temple administrator for a select group of foreign journalists, the first allowed into Tibet since the uprising.



Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSPEK24297420080327

[LaurenG]

5. I tend to believe the monks

Yikes!

[1monster]

6. Yes, especially since they've put their lives on the line by embarrassing the Chinese

government officials...

[gorbal]

7. sign the petition!

Over a million signitures so far....lets help get it up to 20 million before it is delivered-


http://www.avaaz.org/en/tibet_end_the_violence/70.php/?cl=66876