The Snow Lion and the Dragon: Tibet-China Relations begins....

Before the Beijing Olympics, in March and April 2008, serious public unrest and protests had broken out in Tibetan-inhabited parts of the PRC. These spontaneous protests against Chinese rule in Tibet occurred throughout the entire Cholkha-Sum, as the three provinces of traditional, ethnic Tibet are collectively known in Tibetan. (See map p.73) The corresponding name in Chinese is Zãng qu ( ) , the Chinese characters meaning ‘Tibet region’ or ‘Tibet area’.

These three provinces are Ü-Tsang or Central Tibet, which is roughly the PRC’s political and administrative entity known as the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), Amdo, now mostly in China’s Qinghai province, and Kham, now mostly in China’s Sichuan province. As far as is known in India, 218 Tibetans were killed, 1,290 were seriously injured, 6,705 were imprisoned, and many simply disappeared. “In November 2008 the Vice-Governor of the Tibet Autonomous Region Government, Bai Ma Cai Wang, confirmed that 55 Tibetans had been sentenced to jail terms ranging from three years to life after the March 2008 riots. It is believed that up to 200 Tibetans were killed and more than 1300 arrested during the unrest.”

The actual figures could well be much higher. (See Appendix A for the opinion of one Han resident of Lhasa). That the Tibetans living within Tibet are unhappy about being ruled by the Chinese seems to be amply clear.

Support for Tibetan independence from China manifested itself during the movement of the Olympic torch through Paris, France, and in San Francisco in the USA. It was evident that many ethnic Tibetans within the PRC were not happy to be Chinese citizens, and that their views had the support of quite a number of people around the world. To understand the nature of Tibet’s problems with the PRC it is necessary to know something of the background.

To be continued.....