With blackout, China cracks down on largest Tibet protests in 20 yrs

The demonstrations were the most violent since protests by Buddhist monks began in Lhasa on Monday, the anniversary of a failed Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule in 1959. The protests have been the largest in Tibet since the late 1980s, when Chinese security forces repeatedly used lethal force to restore order in the region.

The developments prompted the Dalai Lama, the exiled spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism, to issue a statement saying he was concerned about the situation and appealing to the Chinese leadership to “stop using force and address the long-simmering resentment of the Tibetan people”.

By Friday night, the Chinese authorities had placed much of the central part of the city under a curfew, including neighborhoods around different Buddhist monasteries, according to two Lhasa residents reached by telephone. The military police were blocking roads in some ethnic Tibetan neighborhoods, several Lhasa residents said.

The Chinese government’s official news agency, Xinhua, issued a two-sentence bulletin in English confirming that shops in Lhasa had been set on fire and that other stores had closed because of violence on the streets. But the Chinese news media otherwise carried no news about the protests. The White House responded with expressions of concern, but not direct criticism, although it urged the Chinese authorities to use restraint.

“We believe Beijing needs to respect Tibetan culture, needs to respect multi-ethnicity in their society,” a spokesman, Tony Fratto, said while traveling with President George W Bush to New York. “We regret the tensions between ethnic groups and Beijing.”

The White House said the American ambassador in Beijing, Clark T Randt Jr, in his contacts with the Chinese authorities, had urged restraint.

The disturbances appear to be turning into a major problem for the ruling Communist Party, which is holding its annual meeting of the National People’s Congress this week in Beijing. China is eager to present a harmonious image to the rest of the world as Beijing prepares to play host to the Olympic Games in August.

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