China tells Tibetans that any attempt to separate their region is doomed, writes Clifford Coonanin Dharamsala
GYALO THONDUP, brother of the Dalai Lama and a longtime go-between with Beijing on Tibetan issues, has made a strong call for continued engagement with Beijing, despite the failure of talks so far, as China warned exiles meeting in India against seeking independence.
Chinese leaders told Tibetan exiles gathered this week in the north Indian hill station of Dharamsala for talks on their future direction that any attempt to separate the Himalayan region from China was "doomed".
"Unless we can move to the moon, we have to talk to the Chinese. We're not breaking away, we're not asking for independence, they [the Chinese] are twisting things," Mr Thondup (80), the Dalai Lama's next oldest brother and a former chairman of the Tibetan cabinet, told a briefing in Dharamsala. He rarely appears in public.
He said the current Beijing leadership had backed down on earlier statements indicating that everything was up for discussion except independence and explained that this was the reason why talks were in such difficulty right now.
"People in China are in the dark. I am pleading the case of Tibet and hoping the Chinese treat us equally. Things are changing, the world is changing and I have complete faith in the people of China," said Mr Gyalto.
A fluent Chinese speaker, Mr Gyalto has been instrumental in the exile movement for many years and was involved in setting up the links between the Tibetan exiles and the CIA in the 1950s.
The special meeting of 500 Tibetan exile leaders continued yesterday with all-day private talks. They are trying to decide whether to continue with the Dalai Lama's "middle way" policy, which calls for greater autonomy for the territory without independence. The 73-year-old spiritual and political leader has grown frustrated over fruitless talks with China, saying they have failed.
Younger Tibetan exile groups are calling for a more aggressive approach and seek independence.
The Nobel laureate is in Dharamsala, but is not attending the meeting, which comes after an uprising in March by ethnic Tibetans across western China which was aggressively put down by Beijing.
China says 22 people were killed in the unrest, which marked the biggest challenge to Chinese rule in Tibet in nearly two decades. Tibetan groups say hundreds were killed during the protests and subsequent military crackdown.
For China, Tibet was, is and always will be Chinese. It says it rescued the people of Tibet from enslavement by theocratic rule when the People's Liberation Army marched on Tibet in 1950.
The Dalai Lama fled to India in 1959 after a failed uprising. The Chinese have dismissed the talks as meaningless. "Any attempt to separate Tibet from Chinese territory will be doomed," foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang said in Beijing. "The so-called Tibet government- in-exile is not recognised by any government in the world."
Mr Gyalto has cultivated long links with China, including what he describes as a friendship with former supreme leader Deng Xiaoping. He blames the looting of Tibet on pockets of the military and said the central government was an organ with which the Tibetans could still negotiate.
Kate Saunders, of the International Campaign for Tibet, described Mr Gyalto's statement as a strong call for continued engagement with China. It showed how the exiled leaders were careful not to pre-empt the outcome of the discussion. "Already, diverse views are evident, but there is a sense of solidarity and a sense of urgency," she said.
There are about 5.5 million Tibetans in the whole of the China, including 2.5 million in the Tibetan Autonomous Region, with the remainder scattered in provinces such as Sichuan, Gansu and Yunnan. About half a million live in exile.
"I've been studying Chinese for 60 years," Mr Gyalto said. "The leaders are all the same; they have different opinions, but when it comes to the party line it's difficult for them to take a different approach."