Posted on 03/24/2008 7:53:16 AM PDT by ninonitti
SHANGHAI: A group of prominent Chinese intellectuals has circulated a petition urging the government to stop what it has called a "one-sided" propaganda campaign and initiate direct dialogue with the Dalai Lama.
The petition, which was signed by more than two dozen writers, journalists and scholars, contains 12 recommendations which, taken together, represent a sharp break from the Chinese government's response to the wave of demonstrations that has swept Tibetan areas of the country in recent days.
They come, moreover, at a time when the government is working hard to convey a sense of strong international support for putting down what is being depicted here as a civil disturbance by lawless people being instigated by Tibet's spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, denounced by Beijing as a secessionist, or "splittist."
The violence has turned into a public relations disaster for China before the August Olympics, which it had been hoping to use to bolster its international image.
Though the European Union and the United States have so far said they opposed boycotting the Beijing Games over the crackdown, an EU politician said in remarks published Saturday that European countries should not rule out threatening a boycott if violence continued, The Associated Press reported.
(Excerpt) Read more at iht.com ...
This is the first year I will not be watching a second of the Olympics.
What exactly do the Chinese get out of occupying Tibet?
Tibet contains very rich mineral resources.
Tibet has the world's largest deposits of uranium and borax, half the world's supply of lithium, the second largest copper deposits in Asia, and the largest supplies of iron and chromite in China.
It also has more than 40% of China's present supply of bauxite, gold, and silver, and extensive reserves of oil, coal, tin and zinc. In addition, Tibet has huge tracts of timber.
Since China's 1949 occupation, it has aggressively exploited these resources. Forests have been clear-cut to provide lumber to China's eastern cities. The pace of mining, usually open-pit mining, has accelerated in recent years. Indeed, two of the five pillars of the Tibetan economy, according to Chinese planners, are mining and lumbering
From: http://www.tibetjustice.org/reports/apec_paper.html
It is also a precedent they like to use as justification for claims they still make, but but press politically more than physically, on Nepal, Bhutan and other central Asian territory. To lose it now undermines their "One China" policy which they use to give credibility to their claims on Hong Kong, Taiwan, Inner Mongolia and Xianzhang (the western province inhabited by the Uiguirs who are Muslim).
I wonder how long it will take the anti-human rights Hu Jintao clique to crack these intellectuals heads?
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