Xi Jinping’s
Tibet Challenge
60 Years Of Failed Policies In Tibet
Introduction
With China’s once-a-decade leadership change, the
5th generation of Chinese Communist Party leaders
have inherited both extraordinary power and a
considerable number of major challenges, prominent
among which is China’s continued occupation of
restive Tibet.
Tibetans are arguably challenging China’s
occupation more strongly today than at any time
since the 1950s. The accumulated effect of decades
of failed policies have contributed to a society in
which Tibetans’ human rights are routinely abused
and where they are marginalised politically, socially
and economically. Public protest has taken a tragic
turn with more than 100 individuals choosing to
self-immolate as a form of resistance against China’s
rule, usually with fatal consequences. Meanwhile,
the cycle of protests crushed by military crackdown
that has typified past periods of unrest, is changing.
China is now discovering that a display of force
is unable to prevent mass gatherings of Tibetans,
whether they are praying for those who have selfimmolated or engaging in more confrontational acts
of protest.
Tibetans are moving beyond fear of China’s violent
regime. In recent months increasingly large numbers
of Tibetans have taken to the streets to demonstrate
their opposition to China’s rule. Meanwhile, Tibetans
are embracing new forms of creative resistance,
expressed through music, literature and assertions
of national identity.
Xi Jinping, the leader of China’s 5th generation,
now has the challenge of Tibet on his hands. Little
is known about Xi’s personal opinions on Tibet, but
his father Xi Zhongxun a former vice premier, knew
the Dalai Lama and was close to the 10th Panchen
Lama. In July 2011, speaking in front of the Potala
Palace in Lhasa, Xi Jinping’s adherence to the
Party line was absolute, vowing to “thoroughly fight
against separatist activities by the Dalai clique by
firmly relying on all ethnic groups ... and completely
smash any plot to destroy stability in Tibet and
jeopardize national unity.” (i)
Xi Jinping’s Tibet Challenge highlights China’s
failed policies in Tibet; policies that, despite six
decades of unfettered control, have left Tibetans
resolutely opposed to China’s rule. Xi’s challenge is
a Tibet in crisis, devastated by four generations of
colonial exploitation but possessing a population
whose sense of the Tibetan nation, and whose spirit
and diverse resistance to China’s rule is undiminished
since the day the People’s Liberation Army invaded
Tibet over 60 years ago.
This report summarizes China’s attempts to maintain
the occupation of Tibet through Three Pillars of
Coercive Control – Military Occupation, Colonial
Rule, and Fear and Intimidation. Xi and China’s 5th
generation leaders must now recognize that the
impact of continuing along the same path as previous
generations will only result in greater instability in Tibet
as well as growing international condemnation of
China’s leadership.
We are not alone in recognizing that change in Tibet
must come. A 2012 Reuters report (ii) wrote “Every
generation of [Chinese] leaders must resolve problems
left over from the previous generation,” a source
with leadership ties said. “For Hu, it was Taiwan,” …
“For Xi, it’s Tibet”. Another anonymous party official
told Reuters “More and more government spending,
more and more security, is not going to buy enduring
stability in Tibet... The high-pressure policies can’t
continue forever.”
China’s policy failures have spurred a new generation
of Tibetans, who have never known an independent
Tibet but who are showing a deep commitment
to their nation and asserting their fundamental
right to political, social and economic freedom.
Their resistance is threatening the very stability
and endurance the 5th generation of the Chinese
Communist Party so desire.
Xi’s challenge is to resolve the Tibet issue swiftly
and peacefully, or risk creating an even greater crisis
of geopolitical significance, as Tibetans resist four
generations of China’s failed policies.
Tibet is comprised of the three provinces of Amdo, Kham, and U-Tsang. Amdo is now split by China into the provinces
of Qinghai and part of Gansu. Kham is largely incorporated into the Chinese provinces of Sichuan, Gansu and
Yunnan, and U-Tsang, together with western Kham, is today referred to by China as the Tibet Autonomous Region
(TAR). Tibet’s traditional territory accounts for one quarter of the landmass of today’s People’s Republic of China.
2
China’s military
occupation
February 2013 saw the centenary of the 13th Dalai
Lama’s reassertion of the Independence of Tibet
from the Manchu Empire (1a). Chinese forces were
driven out of Tibet until 1949, when the newly
triumphant Chinese Communist Party (CCP) sought
to consolidate its victory by rapidly spreading its
influence as widely
as possible.
On 7 October 1950, 40,000 People’s Liberation
Army (PLA) troops crossed the Drichu [Yangtse] river
into central Tibet. Overwhelmingly outnumbered,
the Tibetan army were forced to surrender (1b) and
Tibet became an occupied state (1c). The CCP
claim is that Tibetans are among China’s 56 ethnic
nationalities (1d) bound together by a common destiny
(1e) – a fabrication rooted in China’s deep historical
ethnocentrism. But Tibet, a clearly defined nation,
had fulfilled the criteria of a sovereign state three
decades before the founding of the People’s Republic
of China (PRC) (1f). China’s leaders however classified
Tibetans as ‘barbaric uncivilized’ peoples that
should be ‘assimilated or eliminated’ (1g). Tibetans,
fiercely proud and independent, showed no signs of
assimilating and thus the CCP pursued policies to
eliminate the Tibetan nation.
China’s persecution steadily increased, as did Tibetan
resistance, and in March 1959 popular protests
erupted in Lhasa. When the PLA began shelling the
city the 14th Dalai Lama was forced to escape Tibet
and, according to China, 87,000 Tibetans were killed
or arrested as a result of the Uprising (1h). Exactly 50
years later the Dalai Lama said that Beijing’s policies
“thrust Tibetans into such depths of suffering
and hardship that they literally experienced hell
on Earth” (1j). This statement starkly contrasted
with the CCP’s claim to have liberated Tibet from
the “oppressive, feudal rule of the Dalai Lama”
(1k), a medieval, oppressive society consisting of
‘landowners, serfs and slaves’. Ultimately, Beijing’s
condemnation of Tibet’s ‘feudal’ past is a classic
colonialist argument – ‘backwardness’ serving as
a justification for invasion (1l). Pre-invasion, many
Tibetans recognized inequalities in their system and
the Dalai Lama had begun to promote reforms (1m).
The exiled Tibetan government is now a democracy
to which the Dalai Lama has devolved his political
authority (1n).
After 60 years China is still reliant on its military
and paramilitary forces to maintain control of Tibet,
with estimates of between 150,000 – 500,000 PLA
troops stationed on the Tibetan Plateau. The visible
presence of security forces is stepped up around
sensitive anniversaries and periods of unrest (1o),
but China has been unable to entirely suppress
mass demonstrations, notably in 1959, in the late
1980s (when Tibet was placed under martial law)
and in 2008, when more than 150 separate incidents
of protest were recorded across the plateau.
Despite the crackdown that followed the 2008
Uprisings, public protests have continued and take
place regularly, especially in eastern Tibet, often in
conjunction with self-immolations by Tibetan monks,
nuns and laypeople (1p), demonstrating that China’s
military occupation cannot suppress the Tibetan
people’s will to be free.
3
Self-immolation case study, Tsering Kyi
On 3 March 2012 Tsering Kyi, a 20 year-old student from a nomadic
family, poured petrol over her body, marched into the vegetable market
of Machu town in Amdo [Chinese: Maqu, Gansu Province] and set light
to herself, raising her fist above her head. She died at the scene.
As a child she had lived a nomadic way of life, following the yak herds
and sleeping under the stars, but that ended with the fencing of the
grasslands and Tsering Kyi – described by teachers as an “example”
to other children – gradually found herself at the centre of political
unrest. In 2008 Machu erupted in protests and hundreds of Tibetans
were detained in a brutal crackdown. Two years later students from
Tsering Kyi’s own school staged protests calling for freedom and
independence.
Shortly before her final act of defiance, Tsering Kyi told friends and
family, “We should do something for Tibet – life is meaningless if we
don’t do anything for Tibet” (I). Tsering Kyi’s self-immolation was
the 24th confirmed to have taken place in Tibet. Such protests now
exceed 100, across all regions of Tibet.
China now spends more on public security than it
does on international defence (1q). A Human Rights
Watch study in 2011 found that security spending
in the Ngaba region of eastern Tibet [Chinese: Aba,
Sichuan Province] – at the epicentre of the current
wave of self-immolations – has been outstripping that
of non-Tibetan areas of Sichuan Province since 2002.
With a “strike hard” campaign and a new “anti-terrorist”
unit established in 2007, Human Rights Watch argued
that China’s provocative policing contributed to the
unrest of 2008 and since. By 2009, security spending
in the Ngaba region was five times the average of the
rest of Sichuan. With China’s extreme response to
the self-immolation of 20 year-old Phuntsok in March
2011, in which 300 monks were disappeared from Kirti
monastery and two elderly Tibetans beaten to death
at the monastery gates (1r), it is hardly surprising that
Ngaba remains a major centre of unrest.
“
Like other oppressed people around the world
whose freedom movements have recently toppled
authoritarian regimes in the Middle East and
North Africa, the Tibetan people are pushing for
their own freedom. Tibetan resistance within Tibet
has become increasingly diverse, with a renewed
determination to promote the Tibetan national
identity through the spread of a home-grown
movement called Lhakar, or “White Wednesday”,
in which Tibetans consciously engage in and
promote uniquely Tibetan activities.
A widespread cultural renaissance is also
underway, with Tibetan political aspirations
being expressed through music and literature.
With these powerful and creative yet subtle
forms of resistance on the rise throughout Tibet,
China’s military power is becoming increasingly
ineffective.
Every 20 metres along the main road of Aba, police officers and communist officials wearing
red armbands look out for potential protesters. Dozens more paramilitaries sit in ranks outside
shops and restaurants in an intimidating show of force.
”
Journalist Jonathan Watts of The Guardian newspaper, smuggled into Ngaba town in February 2012
4
China’s colonial rule
China’s rule of Tibet is one of the last remaining
remnants of the 20th century-style of colonialism
that was overthrown and denounced by the global
community. China’s goal since 1950, as first
expressed by Mao Zedong, has been to integrate
Tibet with China. But whilst four generations of
colonial policies have created social exclusion,
deprivation and disparities between poor rural
Tibetans and wealthy urban Chinese in Tibet, Tibetans
continue to assert their distinct national identity.
Colonial exploitation of Tibet accelerated when Hu
Jintao became Party Secretary of the TAR in the late
1980s. Hu’s policy of “grasping with both hands”,
which sought to use economic development as a tool
in the “struggle against separatism”, was consolidated
with the launch of China’s Western Development
Strategy (WDS) in 1999 and is still visible today.
Designed to reduce the economic disparity between
the richer eastern seaboard of China and poorer
western provinces, the political objectives of the WDS
were articulated by then President Jiang Zemin, who
said it “will help develop China’s economy, stabilise
local society and contribute to China’s unity” (18
September 2000). Yulu Dawa Tsering, the revered
Tibetan lama and independence campaigner who
died in 2002, said the WDS represented “a period of
emergency and darkness” (2a).
China’s financial investment in Tibet is substantial
(193.1 billion yuan from 2011 to 2015), but the
emphasis on large infrastructure rather than
community-led projects has delivered patchy
development that seldom benefits the poorest
Tibetans; indeed much of the revenue generated
in Tibet goes back into mainland China’s pockets
(2b). The Gormo-Lhasa Railway, by far the largest
project, was completed in 2006 at a cost of 33 billion
yuan. The International Campaign for Tibet reports
that the railway has triggered a “second invasion”
of Chinese into Tibet, facilitating both the swift
deployment of military and the exploitation of Tibet’s
natural resources (2c). Figures from China’s most
recently available census in 2000 give the population
of the entire Tibetan Plateau – including 150 Tibetan
autonomous counties – as at least 10 million,
excluding military and migrant workers. 5.4 million are
listed as Tibetan; the remainder Han or other Chinese
people (2d). As long ago as 2002, officials in the TAR
admitted to foreign journalists that Tibetans would
soon be in a minority in Lhasa (2e).
Dr Andrew Fischer, an economist specialising in Tibet,
has called Tibet’s growth ‘ethnically exclusionary’
(2f). He reported that in 2010 central government
subsidies to the TAR surged to record-high levels,
surpassing 100% of the TAR’s GDP for the first time
ever, exacerbating the region’s extreme economic
dependence on Beijing and consolidating the visible
hand of the state in most aspects of the economy (2g).
Tourism is a major beneficiary of state investment,
with tourists expected to number 15 million by 2015
(2h) – the vast majority of which will be Chinese. In
5
“
Today I went to Jokhang Temple and when I passed the security check, Tibetans had to
register their names while Han Chinese could go right through; as I was about to pass through,
I was grabbed by a police officer who insisted that I register my name! I said that I was a Han
Chinese but he absolutely refused to believe me and kept insisting on seeing my ID card.
”
A Chinese tourist’s account of a visit to Lhasa, June 2012, as recounted by Tibetan poet and blogger Tsering Woeser
2012 China announced further heavy investment in
tourism infrastructure within Tibet, including a new
theme park near Lhasa. However Tibet is routinely
closed to foreign tourists. The TAR is closed during
sensitive political anniversaries and when any large
protest takes place: parts of Amdo and Kham, where
most of the Tibetan self-immolations have taken
place, have also been closed. Even when Tibet is
open, the authorities attempt to tightly control what
tourists see and understand. Tour guides and hoteliers
have been suspended and imprisoned for perceived
indiscretions. Despite the fact that occupation is
no vacation, several international hotel companies,
including Starwood (2j) and InterContinental Hotels,
are operating or plan to operate luxury hotels in Lhasa.
Chinese migration onto the Tibetan plateau coupled
with Tibetan economic marginalisation – poor
education and training preventing Tibetans from
competing for business and employment opportunities
– were among the driving forces behind protests in
Lhasa in 2008 (2k). Since then China has intensified
efforts to marginalize the Tibetan language in favour
of Chinese (2l). In October 2010 over 10,000 Tibetan
students and teachers protested against proposed
education reforms by Qinghai Province, which aimed
to change the primary language of instruction from
Tibetan to Chinese (2m). Street signs are in Chinese,
official documents generally only available in Chinese
and letters addressed in Tibetan are not delivered. But
in spite of China’s efforts, a resurgence of the Tibetan
language as an expression of identity is underway in
Tibet (2n).
In 1998 China announced its final solution – the
elimination of the Tibetan nomadic way of life, which
for millennia has been an intrinsic part of Tibetan
society. In 1998 China’s Agriculture vice-minister Qi
Jingfa, said “All herdsmen are expected to end the
nomadic life by the end of the century” (2o). Although
China missed its own deadline, by January 2011
officials said 1.43 million farmers and herders had
permanent homes (2p). Efforts to force Tibetans into
ghetto-style housing blocks have now intensified
and in May 2012 the State Council announced plans
to resettle the remaining nomad population 246,000
households or 1.157 million nomads across the PRC
by 2015 (2q). For thousands of years, Tibetan nomads
have lived sustainably on the grasslands; now China’s
policy of ‘converting rangelands to pastures’ is leading
to overgrazing in fenced-in areas and exacerbating
desertification (2r). Land, seized under false claims
of ‘environmental protection’ in the age of climate
change, is cleared, often to make way for dams and
mining operations. Coercive settlement is also causing
economic and social problems (2s), likely to fuel
greater unrest. In June 2012, EU High Representative
6
Catherine Ashton publicly recognized this problem
for the first time, saying “...the EU questions whether
the objective of environmental protection can only
be reached by eliminating the traditional way of life
of Tibetans who have lived in harmony with nature
for centuries. The EU is concerned that compulsory
resettlement of all nomads has the potential to destroy
the distinctive Tibetan culture and identity” (2t).
Crisis at the “Third Pole”
China’s colonial policies in Tibet are putting an internationally
significant environment at risk. Known as the Third Pole because
it holds the planet’s third largest store of glacial freshwater, Tibet
is warming twice as fast as the rest of the world. Glacial melt from
the plateau is disrupting water supplies, threatening sustainable
livelihoods and putting more than one billion downstream peoples
at risk (II). China’s solution is to build more dams, including at
least five on the Yarlung Tsangpo, until recently the world’s largest
undammed river. Concerns about the possible impacts of these
dams include downstream nations’ access to a safe, stable water
supply (III), the risk of damming rivers in seismic activity areas (IV)
and threats to the most bio-diverse region in the world (V).
Despite claiming that strengthening environmental protection on the
Tibetan plateau is important for “maintaining border stability, ethnic
unity and the building of a well-off society,” (VI), China’s past and
current policies have brought region-wide famine, desertification
on the grasslands, acute flooding from clear-cutting Tibet’s forests,
and environmental destruction through unregulated mining (VII).
Meanwhile China blames Tibet’s nomads – who for millennia have
lived sustainably on the Plateau – rather than its own policies, for
threatening China’s precious water resources.
Rule by fear
and intimidation
China has used repression as a means to breed fear
among Tibetans and consolidate its control in Tibet
over the last 60 years. In “Worst of the Worst 2012:
The World’s Most Repressive Societies”, a report by
renowned think-tank for democracy Freedom House,
Tibet (which is classified as a disputed territory within
the report) receives the lowest score, ranking it “least
free” alongside Syria, North Korea and Sudan (3a).
China’s control is most pervasive in the religious sphere,
with a series of especially harsh policies. As an integral
part of Tibetan national identity, Tibetan Buddhism is
perceived as a direct challenge to China’s authorities;
and a distinct threat to the unity of the country.
Since the beginning of the invasion China has attacked
Tibetan Buddhism, intensifying the crackdown over
the past decade. In May 2006 former TAR Party
Secretary Zhang Qingli called for the intensification
of the “patriotic education” campaigns (3b), a policy
characterised by denunciations of the Dalai Lama.
Ethnic ‘Autonomy’ versus Cultural Assimilation?
Tibetan unrest has fueled a debate among Chinese intellectuals and
Party officials about whether ethnic ‘autonomy’ is an obstacle to
national cohesion. Ma Rong (Beijing University) has long believed
current policies have rendered the Chinese nation an empty concept
and that the assimilation of minorities is inevitable (VIII). In February
2012 United Front’s Zhu Weiqun advocated removing ethnic status
from identity cards and scrapping minority schooling, suggesting
“Some of our current educational and administrative policies
have unintentionally weakened [minorities’] sense of nationhood
and Chinese nationalism” (IX). Countering opinions, aired during
a symposium convened under the Chinese Academy of Social
Sciences, concluded that turning away from “the basic [ethnic
autonomy] system and policy” could “easily lead to ideological chaos
and thereby cause a negative impact on society” (X).
The Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy
(3c) reported that use of the “patriotic education”
campaign has become “systematic, protracted and
enforced with new-found vigour and zeal”; individuals
failing to denounce the Dalai Lama and praise
Communist leaders are subjected to torture and
imprisonment.
There are currently at least 527 known political
prisoners in Tibet (3d) according to the US State
Department, but the true number is likely to be
considerably higher. In January 2012 several hundred
Tibetans returning from India, where they had traveled
on legitimate papers to attend Kalachakra Teachings
given by the Dalai Lama, were arbitrarily detained and
subjected to patriotic education at various centres
around Lhasa. Human Rights Watch believes it was
the first time since the late 1970s that authorities had
detained Tibetan laypeople in such large numbers (3e).
China’s vilification of the Dalai Lama has been ramped
up in recent years. The pre-eminent representative
of the Tibetan people and a global icon of peace,
the 14th Dalai Lama is viewed by Beijing as enemy
number one, described as a “wolf in monk’s robes”
and “a monster with a human face”. His image is
banned in Tibet, yet protesters – especially those
who have self-immolated – most of whom were not
born when the Dalai Lama was forced to escape from
Tibet, have consistently appealed for his return. China
blames the Dalai Lama for masterminding the wave of
Tibetan self-immolations, calling his prayers for those
who have died through self-immolation “terrorism in
disguise” (3f).
Further extreme measures to intimidate Tibetans by
consolidating control over Tibetan Buddhism include
new regulations ruling that only Chinese authorities
can approve the recognition of reincarnated lamas,
tight restrictions on religious gatherings and practices,
7
Growing Tibetan resistance
In the last five years there has been a surge of resistance by Tibetans
in Tibet; notably the Uprisings in 2008, which were of a scale
previously not witnessed since 1959, but increasing again in recent
months. Since January 2012 more than 20 mass protests have taken
place with demonstrators calling for freedom in Tibet and the return
of the Dalai Lama (XI). China’s response to such protests has been
often brutal, with reports of armed police attacking and beating
demonstrators and, in a number of cases, opening fire, killing peaceful
protesters and seriously injuring many more.
On 8 February 2012 at least 2,000 Tibetans in two different areas of
Yulshul in Amdo [Chinese: Yushu Prefecture, Qinghai Province] took
part in protests despite the intense security crackdown. In Tridu around
1,400 Tibetans took part in a “solidarity” march, instigated initially by
400 monks from from Sekhar monastery. The peaceful protesters carried
banners calling on authorities to respect Tibetans and the Tibetan
language and demanded freedom in Tibet, the return of the Dalai Lama,
and the release of political prisoners, including the 11th Panchen Lama,
Gedhun Choekyi Nyima. In Nangchen hundreds of Tibetans, mainly
young lay people, gathered for an all-day prayer vigil during which they
chanted long-life prayers and slogans in support of the Dalai Lama.
and the permanent stationing of government officials,
in some cases armed security, in monasteries. The
US State Department’s most recent annual report on
religious freedom observes that “CCP control over
religious practice and the day-to-day management
of monasteries and other religious institutions has
tightened” and “official interference in the practice
of Tibetan Buddhist religious traditions generated
profound grievances and contributed to a series of
self-immolations by Tibetans” (3g).
No section of Tibetan society is free of repressive
policies. Yet since 2008, despite China strategically
targeting Tibetan cultural expression, writers,
musicians and educators have emerged at the
forefront of a cultural renaissance, with their
assertions of Tibetan identity challenging dominant
narratives of the Chinese government’s policies in
Tibet. The threat to ‘stability’ posed by these young,
educated Tibetans, who have been brought up
under the communist system, puts them at great
risk of arrest and subsequently torture – over 80
Tibetan intellectuals have been either imprisoned,
disappeared or faced torture due to expressing
their views (3h).
In March 2012 a new Chinese government directive
was issued calling on the public to “expose and
report on anyone committing illegal activities
harming social stability”, offering a reward of 5,000
yuan (about US $796) to “anyone who reports such
criminal activities to public security organs” (3j).
The directive, posted publicly throughout Amdo,
eastern Tibet where numerous protests including
8
self-immolations have taken place, threatened to
“severely crack down” on Tibetans who engage in
“splittist activities”.
Reporters Without Borders recently expressed alarm
at the continuing media blackout in Tibet, noting
“not only are foreign media organisations prevented
from covering these events, but the authorities have
also organized a veritable disinformation campaign,
using pro-government media such as the Global
Times, which play down the disturbances and
accuse the international community of interfering”
(3k). In addition to restricting the flow of information
from Tibet to the outside world, China recently
stepped up control of the flow of information
into Tibet (3m). Tightened restrictions on the use
of communication tools including internet and
telephones were added to new measures described
by TAR Party Secretary Chen Quanguo as necessary
“to ensure the absolute security of Tibet’s ideological
and cultural realm”. Further restrictions on the
publication of literature, including photocopying,
and music publishing have been increased and
government propaganda heightened via new TV
channels, village education sessions, film showings
and distribution of official books.
In addition to imposing a media blackout, China
has refused all requests from foreign diplomats for
access to Tibet in recent months. In response to
the increasing self-immolations in eastern Tibet, the
European Union, Australia and other governments
have sought permission to investigate the situation
on the ground, so far without success.
Recommendations for Xi Jinping
The International Tibet Network calls on Xi Jinping and 5th generation leaders to adopt a paradigm shift in the
Chinese Communist Party’s approach to Tibet that gives full agency over formulating future policies to the
Tibetan people, by first acknowledging its failures and the illegitimacy of its military rule over Tibet. Xi Jinping
must commit to a just and lasting resolution that recognizes the Tibetan people’s right to self-determination
under international law. Xi Jinping must implement the following recommendations immediately:
• Stop the Chinese government’s use of military
force to crackdown on the Tibetan people. As a
matter of urgency, withdraw all security forces
from monasteries and places where protests have
taken place.
• Allow immediate and unfettered access to
Tibet by foreign media, diplomats, international
observers and foreign tourists.
• Cease the harsh and systematic repression of
• Stop environmentally destructive mining and
damming projects, and engage with downstream
nations to implement bottom-up participatory
management of Tibet’s water resources.
• Release all political prisoners detained for
engaging in peaceful protest, arbitrarily detained
or sentenced without a just trial in accordance
with international law immediately and
unconditionally.
religious and cultural life in Tibet, and suspend
with immediate effect the Chinese government’s
patriotic education programme.
• Remove all Party cadres from monasteries in
Tibet with immediate effect, and suspend policies
concerning interference by Chinese authorities in
the selection of reincarnate lamas.
• Ensure the Tibetan people’s right to practice and
promote their language is respected by restoring
the Tibetan language as the primary medium of
instruction in schools and universities.
• Halt all economic and development policies
detrimental to safeguarding the prospects
and livelihood of the Tibetans. Reduce the
dependency of the Tibetan economy on Chinese
government subsidies by favouring bottom
up, sustainable development models that
offer opportunities to disadvantaged Tibetans
and cease all financial incentives for Chinese
settlement onto the plateau.
• End and reverse the coercive policy of nomad
settlement; suspend all ongoing settlements and
allow those nomads already settled to return to
their land and way of life if they wish, and their
cancelled long term land leases restored. Allow
the Tibetans to be full partners in all decisions
over land use in Tibet.
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Recommendations to world governments
• Establish and participate in a contact group or
multilateral forum by world governments to devise
and implement new, more robust, coordinated
strategies for resolving the Tibet crisis.
• Vigorously pursue actions in appropriate
international forums that will focus the attention of
the government of the PRC on the severity of the
situation in Tibet and on the legitimate concern
of the international community that Tibetans
enjoy the rights and freedoms enshrined in the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other
international covenants to which China is a party.
• Utilize all opportunities to raise bilateral concern
about Tibet, emphasizing the failure of security,
economic and development policies to achieve
stability in Tibet and urge the immediate adoption
of measures to address the legitimate grievances
of the Tibetan people.
• Express strong public condemnation of China’s
intensifying religious and cultural repression
in Tibet, with specific reference to widespread
programmes of “patriotic education” and harsh
measures to punish individuals for peaceful
expression of their cultural and political freedom.
and demand from China assurances that foreign
journalists be allowed unfettered access to the
TAR and Tibetan areas of Sichuan, Qinghai, Gansu
and Yunnan.
• Expand capacity to monitor the situation in Tibet,
including continuing to push for greater access
to Tibet. Initiate or elevate efforts to establish a
diplomatic presence in Lhasa, and expand existing
resources within Beijing embassies for monitoring.
• Raise strong concerns over the failure of economic
and development policies in Tibet, including the
lack of Tibetan participation in shaping these
policies.
• Call for a halt to the forced resettlement of Tibetan
nomads and the loss of an ancient, sustainable
way of life and urge China to adopt best practice
models of participatory governance of Tibet’s
fragile environment and water resources.
• Increase programmatic support for Tibetans
in Tibet and for programmes that facilitate
information exchange between Tibetans in exile
and in Tibet.
• Urgently seek to send diplomats to affected areas
“
…more visible, public and coordinated diplomacy is necessary for the
Chinese government to feel pressure to alter its conduct.
10
”
US Congressmen James P McGovern and Frank R Wolf to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
Sources
Introduction
(i)BBC, ‘Xi Jinping: China will “smash” Tibet separatism’,
July 2011
(ii)Reuters, ‘Does China’s next leader have a soft spot for
Tibet?’, September 2012
China’s military occupation
1a. Tibet Justice Center
1b. Tsering Shakya, ‘Dragon in the Land of Snows’, 1999
1c. On 30 March 2011, Court No. 2 of Spain’s National High
Court, the Audiencia Nacional, acknowledged Tibet is an
occupied state under international law
1d. Liu Yandong, first China Tibetan Culture Forum October
2006
1e. China White Paper 28 September 2009
1f. Delaney, Cusack and van Walt van Praag, ‘The Case
Concerning Tibet’, 1998
1g. International Campaign for Tibet, ‘Jampa, the Story of
Racism in Tibet’, 2001, page 24
1h. Radio Lhasa broadcast, 1 October 1960
1j. The Times, 10 March 2009
1k. Blog post by James Reynolds, BBC, 19 January 2009
1l. Lhadon Tethong, ‘China’s favorite propaganda on
Tibet... and Why it’s Wrong’
1m. Tsering Shakya, ‘Tibet and China: the past in the
present’, 2009
1n. International Campaign for Tibet, ‘FAQ: The Dalai
Lama’s Relinquishing His Political Role’
1o. Tibet Justice Center
1p. Resistance in Tibet: Self-immolation and Protest
1q. In 2010 public security spending was RMB 549bn
($84bn) and defence spending RMB 533. 4bn, Reuters,
5 March 2011
1r. International Campaign for Tibet Report, 22 April 2011
Self-immolation case study, Tsering Kyi
(I)
Free Tibet, ‘Tibetan Schoolgirl Dies’, March 2012
China’s colonial rule
2a. Tibet Information Network, ‘China’s Great Leap West’,
2000
2b. Tibet Watch Special Report, ‘Perversities of Extreme
Dependence and Unequal Growth in the TAR’, Andrew
M Fischer, August 2007
2c. International Campaign for Tibet, ‘Tracking the Steel
Dragon’
2d. China Data 2010 census is intended to count the
floating migrant population. See here
2e. New York Times, 8 August 2002
2f. A M Fischer, ‘Perversities of Extreme Dependence and
Unequal Growth in the TAR’, 2007. Available from here
2g. International Institute of Social Studies, ‘The Revenge of
Fiscal Maoism in China’s Tibet [working title]’ by Andrew
M Fischer, 2012
2h. Padma Choling, 16 January 2011
2j. St Regis opens in Lhasa
2k. Gongmeng Law Research Center, ‘An investigative
report into the social and economic causes of the 3.14
incident in Tibetan areas’, 2009
2l. Tsering Woeser’s Blog, ‘When Tibetan Students fight for
the Tibetan language’, 2010, translated by High Peaks
Pure Earth
2m. BBC report, 20 October 2010
2n. Tsering Shakya, ‘The Politics of Language’, December
2007
2o. Qin Jingfa, Vice Minister of Agriculture, quoted in Xinhua
18 March 1998. Available from here See page 8
2p. Padma Choling, 16 January 2011
2q. Southern Mongolian Human Rights Center
2r. Oliver W Frauenfeld and Tingjun Zhang, ‘Is Climate
Change on the Tibetan Plateau Driven by Land Use/
Cover Change?’ 2005
2s. Feng Yongfeng, ‘The Tibetan Plateau: the plight of
ecological migrants’, 2008
2t. Catherine Ashton, ‘Speech on the situation in Tibet’,
12 June 2012
Crisis at the Third Pole
(II) International Campaign for Tibet ‘Tracking the Steel
Dragon’, 2008, pg 231
(III) The Guardian, 24 May 2010
(IV) Geologist Yang Yong quoted by the South China
Morning Post, 1 May 2010
(V) Conservation International
(VI) State Council Meeting chaired by Wen Jiabao, 30 March
2011
(VII) Tibet: Environment & Development Desk, ‘Resource
Extraction and Development’, 2012
Rule by fear and intimidation
3a. Freedom House, ‘Worst of the Worst 2012: The Most
Repressive Societies’
3b. Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, May
2006
3c. Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy,
Annual Report 2009
3d. US State Department Country Reports on Human Rights
Practices for 2011
3e. Human Rights Watch, ‘China: End Crackdown on
Tibetans Who Visited India’
3f. The Guardian, 19 October 2011
3g. US State Department, ‘International Religious Freedom
Report 2011’
3h. International Campaign for Tibet, ‘A Raging Storm: The
Crackdown on Tibetan Writers and Artists after Tibets
Spring 2008 Protests’
3j. International Campaign for Tibet, ‘Chinese government
addresses unrest with threats and cash to informants’,
March 2012
3k. Reporters Without Borders, ‘Authorities Tighten Grip,
Isolating Even More From The Outside World’, March
2012
3m. Human Rights Watch, ‘China: Attempts to Seal off Tibet
from Outside Information’, July 2012
Ethnic ‘Autonomy’ versus Cultural Assimilation?
(VIII)James Leibold, La Trobe University Australia, May 2012.
(IX) Minnie Chan, SCMP, 15 February 2012, quoting Zhu
Weiqun’s article in Study Times
(X) Liu Ling, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences Institute
of Ethnology and Anthropology, “Persist in the Basic
Political System, Resolve Ethnic Issues Through
Development – An Outline of the Chinese Ethnic Theory
Association Symposium”, 23 February 2012
Growing Tibetan Resistance
(XI) International Tibet Network, ‘Resistance in Tibet:
Self-immolations and Protest’, 2013
11
We are the sharp wisdom that your speeches and lectures haven’t reached
We are the smooth darkness that your flame and power hasn’t absorbed
We are the response with playfulness that makes your heart ache
We are the infection and fright to your livelihood!
The new generation has a resource called youth
The new generation has a pride called confidence
The new generation has an appearance called playfulness
The new generation has a temptation called freedom
Song Lyrics by Yudrug, a popular Tibetan band from Machu, eastern Tibet, 2010
October 2012
www.tibetnetwork.org