Thu, Mar 12, 2009 page5

• China heaps scorn on the Dalai Lama

  ‘WHINER’ Dismissing the Dalai Lama’s criticism as a childish attempt to draw global attention, the official media said Chinese control had made Tibet a ‘paradise on earth’

  • AFP
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  China poured scorn on the Dalai Lama through its state media yesterday, accusing him of speaking gibberish, portraying him as a whining child and describing Tibet as an earthly paradise.

  Official media commentaries accused the Dalai Lama of scheming to restore “theocratic” rule and rejected the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader’s claim that Chinese control had turned his homeland into a “hell on Earth.”

  “This ‘hell on earth’ is precisely ‘paradise on earth’ for ordinary Tibetans,” the official Xinhua news agency said in one of a series of sharply worded editorials.

  “Like a child trying to draw attention from other people by crying, the marginalized old monk started a round of false accusations which were rhetorically inflammatory and demagogic but untenable in fact,” another editorial said.

  The vitriol came a day after the tense anniversary of a failed 1959 uprising passed in Tibet under a Chinese security lockdown aimed at preventing a recurrence of widespread unrest that broke out 12 months ago.

  The commentaries sought to rebut a speech the Dalai Lama made on Tuesday to mark the 50th anniversary.

  The Tibetan spiritual leader, who fled into exile shortly after the uprising was put down, said heavy-handed Chinese control since then had turned Tibet into a “hell on Earth” and brought “untold suffering and destruction.”

  The Xinhua commentaries repeatedly ridiculed the Dalai Lama and his speech.

  “The Dalai Lama abruptly shook off his pacifist outlook and smiles to give some gibberish far below the intelligence of the ‘spiritual leader’ himself, and poles apart from truth,” it said.

  Xinhua also repeated China’s position that the Dalai Lama wants independence for his homeland after 58 years of Chinese rule, rejecting his assertion he only wants autonomy and an end to repression of Tibetans.

  “Since their exile, the Dalai Lama and his followers have never stopped pursuing activities to split Tibet from China and restore their theocratic rule, despite his claims to the opposite,” Xinhua said.

  While saying it remains open to talks with the Dalai Lama, China has frequently denounced him in the past as a “wolf in monk’s robes” and rejected his calls for reconciliation as a “separatist” subterfuge.

  Amid the increased tensions, the US Department of State on Tuesday urged Beijing to open a dialogue with the Dalai Lama and expressed concern over “harmful” Chinese policies in the Himalayan region.

  But the harsh comments by the official media, following denunciations of the Dalai Lama by Chinese officials, appeared to confirm Beijing would not abandoned its hardline stance on Tibet.

  Such rhetoric plays well domestically and with some overseas Chinese but will likely worsen the animosity with Tibetans and distrust abroad, said Robbie Barnett, a Tibet expert at Columbia University in New York.

  “It makes China look like an aggressive state that people in the rest of the world would probably feel uncomfortable with as being a rising force in the developing world,” Barnett said.

  “They are just adding fuel to the fire about Tibetans’ unease and complaints,” he said.
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