Tibet: 50 years on

Source: AsiaOne

Dalai Lama: Chinese-ruled Tibet 'hell on earth'

DHARAMSHALA, INDIA - Tibet's exiled spiritual leader the Dalai Lama accused China of having brought "hell on earth" to his homeland in a speech Tuesday on the sensitive 50th anniversary of a failed uprising.

As Chinese authorities deployed a massive security force across the Tibetan plateau to prevent protests, he demanded "meaningful autonomy" for the region in a speech at his exile base in northern India.

Residents of Tibet's capital, Lhasa, reported no protests Tuesday morning but -- as in other Tibetan areas of China -- it appeared to be partly because armed soldiers and police were patrolling the streets in a show of force.

The Dalai Lama said China had brought "untold suffering and destruction" to the Himalayan region in a wave of repressive campaigns since the uprising on March 10, 1959 that forced him to flee.

"These thrust Tibetans into such depths of suffering and hardship that they literally experienced hell on earth," he said, adding they caused the deaths of "hundreds of thousands" of his people.

"Even today Tibetans in Tibet live in constant fear," he said. "Their religion, culture, language, identity are near extinction. The Tibetan people are regarded like criminals, deserving to be put to death."

Source: Xinhua

Dalai Lama's utter distortion of Tibet history

BEIJING, March 10 (Xinhua) -- On March 10, 1959, the Dalai Lama and his supporters started an armed rebellion in a desperate attempt to preserve Tibet's feudal serfdom and split the region from China.

On Tuesday, exactly 50 years later, the Dalai Lama claimed that Tibetans have been living in "hell on earth," as if the Tibet under the former feudal serfdom ruled by him were a heaven.

The Dalai Lama also alleged at a gathering in India's Dharamsala to mark his 50 years in exile that "these 50 years have brought untold suffering and destruction to the land and people of Tibet."

Unfortunately, the Dalai Lama has not only been on the wrong side of history, but also has got the history upside down. Miseries of "hell on earth" and "untold suffering" occurred nowhere but in the slavery Tibet symbolized by the Dalai Lama.

Even from historical books written by Western scholars, people can draw the conclusion that Tibet under the rule of the Dalai Lama clique was a society of feudal serfdom that trampled human rights and easily reminded visitors of the dark age of medieval Europe.

The feudal serfdom had truly brought "untold suffering and destruction" to the serfs and slaves who accounted for 90 percent of the then population.

The slavery Tibet was just "hell on earth" as Carles Bell, who lived in Lhasa as a British trade representative in the 1920s, observed that the Dalai Lama's theocratic position enabled him to administer rewards and punishments as he wished. That was because he held absolute sway over both this life and the next of the serfs and coerced them with that power.

So which side to you believe? Most would take the sympathetic view that Tibet should be autonomous. I'm not sure I take that view. Most of you know me as anti-communist as anyone. However, China claimed Tibet just like different countries have claimed other regions. Once Tibet is a part of China it has to abide by its rules no matter how crazy they are. Tibet was under Chinese rule during the Ching dynasty as well.