Beijing, June 9 – Amid sensitive negotiations between Beijing and the Dalai Lama’s envoys, China’s official media on Monday slammed a recent US government report on Tibet as interference in its internal affairs and accused Washington of giving tacit support to the ‘Tibetan independence’
movement so as to “contain” the communist nation.
“Both the “Tibet issue” and the Dalai Lama are used as a card by the US anti-China force in its attempt to contain China,” a signed article issued by the official Xinhua news agency said.
The article says that the US government, by distorting the facts, has tried its best to “puff” the Dalai Lama, who escaped from Tibet to India following a failed uprising against Chinese rule in Tibet in 1959.
The article accused Washington of patently profaning the will of several million Tibetan people in China.
“By putting pressures or even threat on the Chinese government, it is interfering in China’s internal affairs, which hurts the progress of Tibet, the stability of Chinese society and the improvement and development of Sino-US relations,” the article says.
“Such interference can but meet with firm Opposition from the Chinese government and create further distrust in the US by all Chinese people including Tibetans,” it said.
Criticising US President George W Bush for submitting a report on Tibet to Congress on May 8, the article said the “Tibet issue” essentially arose from the fact that for nearly a century western imperialist forces fostered and supported Tibetan separatists attempting to separate Tibet from China.
The highly critical article has appeared amid the visit of the four-member delegation led by the Dalai Lama’s envoy in the US Lodi Gyaltsen Gyari to hold talks with the Chinese government on the possible resumption of dialogue between Beijing and the Tibet government in exile.
The Xinhua article points out that the report on the one hand reiterates that the US recognises the Tibet autonomous region to be part of the People’s Republic of China, whereas it claims on the other that it supports the Dalai Lama’s “middle way approach” of seeking “genuine autonomy”.
While the US report recognises Tibet to be part of China, it also holds that the Dalai Lama represents the views of the vast majority of Tibetans.
“Such a view is quite illogical if not ill-natured,” the Xinhua article says.
The report says an “important objective” of the US is to encourage the Chinese government and the Dalai Lama to hold substantive dialogue, to lead to a negotiated settlement on “questions related to Tibet.”
Brushing aside US concerns over the Tibet issue for protecting Tibetan language and culture, the article said only Beijing can protect the language and religion of the area.
“It is not the US government or the Dalai Lama … But the Chinese government and the Tibet autonomous regional government that best know how to safeguard the fundamental interest of the Tibetan people,” the article said.
