IN the ancient back alleys of Tibet's capital,
Lhasa, a grim military operation has played out this week, hidden from
the eyes of the world. As night falls, hundreds of Chinese troops fan
out across this rebellious city, armed with riot shields and assault
rifles.
They
set up sentry posts on street corners and dispatch patrols in groups of
six soldiers, three with shields and three with guns.
These patrols spend the night walking down the lanes of Lhasa's
Tibetan quarter, looking for any signof dissent. They glare at me
asthey pass, angry at the presence of a foreigner.
When the sun rises, the soldiers do not melt away, but are replaced
by a new rotation of troops. The military stranglehold on Lhasa by day
is maintained with one chilling addition -- snipers are installed on
rooftops around the city's most holy site, the Jokhang Temple, ready to
train their guns on the hundreds of Tibetan pilgrims praying in Barkhor
Square below.
Only months after the Beijing Olympics, there is no post-Games euphoria in Tibet.
Hopes of greater autonomy and freedom have been stifled by Beijing,
which -- stung by bloody anti-Chinese riots in March and by the
indignity of the subsequent Olympic torch relay protests -- has come
down on Tibetans with an iron fist.
During four days in Lhasa this week -- the first visit to Tibet by
an Australian journalist since the March riots that left up to 200
people dead -- I witnessed a city creaking under the weight of the
Chinese military.
In meeting local Chinese government officials, it was apparent that
Beijing has lost patience with those Tibetans who oppose its rule and
has chosen the path of zero tolerance.
The heavy military presence betrays China's unspoken fear that it is
losing, rather than winning, the hearts and minds of local Tibetans,
who accuse Beijing of subjugating their culture and religion to
preserve national unity.
In an interview with The Weekend Australian, the vice-governor of
the Tibet Autonomous Region, Bai Ma Cai Wang, reveals that China has
recently boosted its security presence in Lhasa above and beyond the
crackdown that followed the March riots. This is China's first public
acknowledgment that it has beefed up its security forces in Tibet.
"In order for Tibet's stability and for people's safety and for
people's desire for security and order, the Government has moderately
adjusted the presence of the police force on the street," he says.
Bai Ma says the Government fears a repeat of the March riots, which
he says were the work of the exiled Dalai Lama and his supporters.
"After the March 14 riots, the Dalai Lama and his followers have
speeded up their separatist activities." Despite being the spiritual leader of the Tibetan Buddhist
population, the Dalai Lama has been airbrushed from view in Lhasa by
the Chinese, who accuse him of being a political activist for an
independent Tibet. There are no pictures or portraits of him in public
areas, and Tibetans are reluctant to praise him in public, fearing
retribution.
"The image of the Dalai Lama in Tibetan people's
minds has already gone away," says Bai Ma. But the long lines of
Tibetans waiting to pay homage to the tombs of former Dalai Lamas in
Lhasa's imposing Potala Palace, and the thousands of passionate
Buddhist pilgrims who prostrate themselves each day outside the Jokhang
Temple suggest otherwise.
I visited Tibet with News Limited
journalist Steve Lewis and federal Liberal MP Michael Johnson,
vice-chairman of the Australia-China Parliamentary Friendship group, at
the invitation of the Chinese Government, which urged us: "Tell
Australians what you have heard and seen about the truth in Tibet."
This
gave us access to high-level Communist Party officials,
parliamentarians and local governors in Lhasa, but the official program
included no meetings with senior Buddhists and no one whose views
strayed from the official line.
When I asked for permission to
visit Drapchi prison, where at least 202 people involved in the March
riots remain incarcerated, I was refused.
It was only when we
slipped away from our hotel at night and found some of the few Tibetans
who spoke English that we heard alternative views. Even then they were
reluctant to talk, fearing they might be seen or overheard by the
authorities. One monk told us there were "more and more Chinese, more
and more soldiers" in Lhasa in recent weeks.
But no one will
speak out, he says, because of fears they will be reported to the
police. "Detectives, they listen to what you say ... sometimes
(Barkhor) square is full of detectives listening in."
He says
Tibetans "feel very bad" about the situation but are powerless to stop
it. Another monk claimed that the Chinese had installed listening
devices in the main tourist sites where Westerners might interact with
Tibetans, and said no one felt safe talking to foreigners about the
political situation in Tibet.
On Monday, we witnessed a group
of monks being placed in a police van and taken away but attempts to
get an explanation were unsuccessful.
The Chinese authorities
have gone to extraordinary lengths to monitor local Tibetans,
installing CCTV cameras on buildings and deploying plainclothes police
as well as the more overt scrutiny of the large numbers of uniformed
police and soldiers.
In interviews with local Chinese
officials, their frustration with the situation was palpable. They
cannot understand why years of economic growth in Tibet have failed to
quell Tibetan demands for greater autonomy or independence from China.
There is little understanding or acceptance that Tibetans may have
different priorities.
In meetings this week, Chinese officials
quoted statistics showing vast improvements in the health, housing,
wellbeing and life expectancy of the Tibetans. The Chinese Government
has poured billions of dollars into Tibet's economy, with state
subsidies accounting for 75 per cent of the gross domestic product.
The
results can be seen in and around Lhasa, with wide new roads, upmarket
fashion stores and whitegoods stores boasting widescreen televisions.
There is a thriving middle class of fashionably dressed locals with
mobile phones glued to their ears and driving the latest cars.
The
problem is that almost all of this middle class in Lhasa are Han
Chinese immigrants, rather than local Tibetans who are primarily
herdsmen and farmers and lack the literacy skills and education to
seize the opportunities created by the Chinese investment. "While a
minority of Tibetans have been rewarded with state jobs, the majority
of Tibetans, who are poorly equipped to access new economic
opportunities, have been marginalised," says Ben Hillman, a Tibet
expert from the Australian National University's China Institute.
So
the frustration of local Tibetans goes beyond the eroding of their
culture and traditions under Chinese rule -- it is also an economic
development issue similar to many around the world where an indigenous
people are marginalised by more commercially successful immigrants.
There
are signs Chinese officials realise their mistake in focusing too
heavily on infrastructure rather than on the Tibetans themselves.
"The
education program in Tibet is still not satisfactory," says Wang
Jinjun, vice-director-general of the State Council Information Office.
"The policy now is to better tackle the issue of herdsmen and farmers."
The economic plight of Tibetans has not been helped by the
March riots, which all but killed tourism. Shops and cafes are empty
and there is barely a foreign tourist to be seen.
Tibetans
have only themselves to blame for this, because so many of them
supported the riots, in which 1317 people were arrested, says Wang De
Wen, of the Tibet People's Congress.
The riots "were organised
by Tibet separatists headed by the Dalai Lama and his followers, who
are not willing to see the great leap forward in the development of
Tibet, so they instigated violent incidents which involved the
smashing, the grabbing, the looting and the setting fire to shops,"
says Wang. "This violent incident has wreaked havoc on the economic
situation and the life of the Tibet people and has cost 320 million
yuan ($70 million) since March."
The deputy secretary-general
of the Tibet People's Congress, Tonga, was reluctant to talk about
those who were detained after the riots, but claimed the majority of
Tibetans involved now regretted their actions.
"After our
re-education program most of them will regret what they have done,"
Tonga says. When pressed further on what this means he adds: "A
relevant government official briefed them on what was right and what
was wrong."
Tibetan officials we spoke to denied all claims
that the religious freedom of Tibetans was being curtailed. The head of
religious affairs of the Tibet Autonomous Region, Kalsang, denied
widely reported views in the West that monks were required to denounce
the Dalai Lama as part of "patriotic education" programs in
monasteries.
He was partly contradicted several days later by
Wang Jinjun who conceded that monks in Tibet were being given "legal
information programs" in which they were told not to mix religion with
politics.
The most striking aspect of the meetings with
Chinese officials was the extent of their hostility towards the Dalai
Lama who, along with the the self-styled Tibetan government in exile in
India, is blamed for fomenting the uprising and for turning the Tibet
issue into a cause celebre in the West.
The Chinese dismiss
the Dalai Lama's repeated assertion that he seeks only greater autonomy
for Tibet, rather than independence.
When I ask whether
China's problems in Tibet might be eased by granting greater autonomy
while still retaining national control of the region, Wang Jinjun is
dismissive, saying it would return Tibet to its feudal origins. "Tibet
will not be reduced to a backwater society which features theocratic
rule," he says.
The human dimension of this intractable
problem can best be seen by taking a walk through Lhasa, where on my
last day I saw a group of Tibetan women, with their babies strapped to
their backs, talking and laughing under the watchful eye of a rooftop
sniper. |
