Tibet: Two Women Self Immolate

Sad and difficult to understand news from Tibet. The New York Times reports:

Two Tibetan women killed themselves by self-immolation in two different Tibetan regions of western China over the weekend, according to reports by Tibetan exile groups and Radio Free Asia, which is financed by the United States government.

The two deaths bring the number of Tibetans who have set fire to themselves in western China since March 2011 to at least 24; at least 16 have died.

The Radio Free Asia report said that Rinchen, a 32-year-old widow and mother of three, killed herself by self-immolation on Sunday in front of Kirti Monastery in the town of Aba, known in Tibetan as Ngaba. A report by Free Tibet, an advocacy group, said Rinchen had four children.

On Saturday, a woman who attends a middle school in Maqu County in Gansu Province set fire to herself in a vegetable market, Radio Free Asia reported. On Monday, the Tibetan Women’s Association, an exile advocacy group, identified the woman who killed herself as Tsering Kyi, age 19; Free Tibet said she was 20.

The group said the two self-immolations were the first by Tibetan laywomen in Tibet’s history. Previously, only nuns or former nuns had set fire to themselves.

AP has more details:

The reported deaths came on the eve of the opening of China's annual legislative session, a time when security is tightened across the country. March is also a sensitive time for Tibet, marking several anniversaries, including that of the unsuccessful revolt against China that caused Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama to flee in 1959, and deadly anti-government riots that rocked the Tibetan capital Lhasa in 2008....

Free Tibet director Stephanie Brigden said Rinchen's self-immolation was the result of repression and attempts to assimilate Tibetans into Han Chinese culture.
"Tibetans are living under de facto martial law. China's response to protests — which are increasingly widespread — has been to intensify repression and surveillance, pushing Tibet deeper into crisis," she said in a statement.

China says it treats minority groups such as Tibetans fairly, and pours tens of billions of dollars into improving living conditions in their areas. The government has also accused the Dalai Lama and overseas Tibetans of being behind the protests and self-immolations.

The message from these self immolations could not be clearer. What is more difficult by far for me is comprehending how taking one's own life aligns with Buddhism's strong belief in doing no harm and in refraining from killing.

Fifty Years Of Exile

The New York Times reports:

The Dalai Lama delivered on Tuesday one of his harshest attacks on the Chinese government in recent times, saying that the Chinese Communist Party had transformed Tibet into a “hell on earth” and that the Chinese authorities regard Tibetans as “criminals deserving to be put to death.”

“Today, the religion, culture, language and identity, which successive generations of Tibetans have considered more precious than their lives, are nearing extinction,” said the Dalai Lama, 73, the spiritual leader of the Tibetans.

Those words came during a blistering speech made Tuesday morning in Dharamsala, India, the Himalayan hill town that is the seat of the Tibetan government-in-exile. Tibetans outside of China and their supporters held rallies around the world on Tuesday to mark the 50th anniversary of a failed Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule. The Chinese military crushed the rebellion, forcing the Dalai Lama to flee across the Himalayas to India.

The furious tone of the Dalai Lama’s speech may have been in reaction to a new clampdown by China on the Tibetan regions. The Dalai Lama might also have adopted an angry approach to placate younger Tibetans who have accused the Dalai Lama of being too conciliatory toward China. The Dalai Lama advocates genuine autonomy for Tibet and not secession, while more radical Tibetans are urging the Dalai Lama to support outright independence.

Sadly, I cannot think of anything that can be done that will bring to Tibet and China peace and reconciliation.

Instead Of A Losar Celebration, A Prayer For Peace In Tibet

AP reports:

XIAHE, China (AP) — Only a handful of pilgrims gathered here last weekend at the historic Labrang monastery, normally bustling before the Tibetan New Year.

"There was a war in Lhasa this year. Lots of Tibetans were killed," one resident murmured, referring to protests last March against Chinese rule that broke out in the Tibetan capital and spread to other cities in western China, including Xiahe. The unrest was the largest and most sustained in decades.

"There is no new year festival for us," the woman said.

The Dalai Lama, Tibet's spiritual leader, called this week on Tibetans to skip festivities surrounding the new year, which begins Wednesday, saying they would be inappropriate after the Chinese government's heavy-handed crackdown on the protests. Tibetans across the region say they are still in mourning.

The Dalai Lama also denounced Chinese-backed celebration plans as "provocations."

Adding to the tension — and authorities' tightening grip on large swathes of Gansu, Sichuan and Qinghai provinces with sizable Tibetan communities — is the approaching 50th anniversary of a failed Tibetan uprising on March 10.

And so, I offer the following prayer for Losar:

May all beings refrain from killing and prevent others from killing. May all beings be happy. May all beings be free from suffering and the causes of suffering. May all beings be free from hatred. May all beings have equanimity, so they have neither too much grasping or too much aversion. May all beings have the spiritual bliss that is untouched by suffering. May all beings be safe. May all beings be well. May all beings live in peace in Gaza and Israel. May all beings live in peace in China and Tibet. May all beings live in peace throughout the world. May all beings realize their enlightenment.

Olympic Protesters Punished Without Trials

Evidently, it's not a really good idea to assert free speech rights in China or to protest the policies of the Chinese government. If you're Chinese, as I previously wrote, you can be sent to "re-education through labor" if you apply five times to get a permit to protest legally. And what if you're a US Citizen and you protest? You are summarily punished without trial. Or deported. After all, protests about freedom for Tibet, or anything else that might offend you about the Chinese Government's policies, might tarnish the luster of the perfect, mechanistic Olympics.

The New York Times reports:

Six Americans who were taken into custody on Tuesday as they tried to protest against China’s rule in Tibet have been given 10-day detentions, the Chinese police said Friday.

But members of their organization, the New York-based Students for a Free Tibet, said that they had no information about four other protesters — two Americans, a German and a British citizen — who were detained early Thursday during a protest near the National Stadium. Extrajudicial detentions are a common form of punishment for Chinese dissidents, but are rarely handed out to foreigners, who are often deported almost immediately after being taken into custody. Members of Students for a Free Tibet have staged eight protests involving 55 people since the Olympics began on Aug. 8, and human rights advocates said the government might be seeking to deter those contemplating similar activities in the Games’ final days.

/snip

Reached by telephone, Public Security Bureau officials declined to comment, but faxed a two-sentence statement explaining that the six Americans had been “apprehended for upsetting public order.” The statement, which did not include the detainees’ names, said the men were being held at the Dongcheng police station.

You read that right. Extrajudicial detentions means punishment without trial. And the offense is "upsetting public order."

What exactly did these protesters do that so grievously "upset public order"?

Most of the organization’s demonstrations have involved unfurling “Free Tibet” banners or displaying Tibetan flags, which are illegal in China. In the latest action, four protesters raised their fists and shouted slogans while waving a Tibetan flag near the National Stadium. As at the other protests, the participants were quickly bundled off by plainclothes police officers.

So. The protesters are summarily detained and punished without trial. But it gets more interesting:

Two photographers for The Associated Press were also roughed and taken into custody, according to news agency reports and press freedom advocates. The police questioned them for 30 to 40 minutes and took the memory cards from their cameras.

The Foreign Correspondents Club of China has received dozens of complaints from foreign journalists who have been detained, trailed or had equipment damaged by the police.

How dare anyone so grievously upset public order during the Olympics! How dare newspeople and photographers actually do their jobs and record the protests! Didn't Chairman Mao write, "Let a hundred flowers bloom; let a hundred schools of thought contend?" Well maybe. But he must not have meant during the Olympics.

Let The Games Begin!

Lost in the July 3 rush to start July 4th partying is the Commander Athlete in Chief's announcement that he will support the athletes by attending the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics. This direct, single digit salute to people who care about human rights in China and who are concerned about the continuing genocide in Darfur, was delivered to avoid outcry. Put another way, it reeks of cowardice.

The New York Times reports:

The White House said Thursday that President Bush would attend the opening ceremonies of the Beijing Olympics next month, a decision fraught with international political symbolism that quickly drew criticism from advocates for human rights.

The advocates have been pressing world leaders to boycott the Olympics or at least skip the opening ceremonies to protest China’s violent crackdown after riots in Tibet and its support for the government of Sudan, whose Darfur region remains enmeshed in violence.

The leaders of Britain and Germany have said they will skip the opening ceremonies. For some time, the White House has said that Mr. Bush will attend the Games, but has refused to provide further details.

That changed late on Thursday afternoon. With most of official Washington already gone for the Fourth of July holiday, the White House press secretary, Dana Perino, issued a simple statement outlining Mr. Bush’s August travel schedule, including the notation that he would go to the opening ceremonies.

The president's press secretary mouthpiece, who gives frequent evidence of being both utterly tone deaf and unable to distinguish facts from opinions, explained in an interview:

“This is a decision by the president that he really wanted to go in support of our athletes,” Ms. Perino said in an interview. Asked if Mr. Bush was making a political statement, she said, “He does not look at it that way, but we recognize that others may.”

Support? At the opening ceremony? The opening ceremony is just a parade dressed up like a Super Bowl Halftime.

And he doesn't look at it as a political statement? I know the administration considers bike riding and brush cutting more important than foreign policy and genocide, but come on. This isn't an athletic event; it's a propaganda display. Someone more talented than I in inventing fiction should have a go at explaining this. Personally, I think it heralds a proliferation of magnetic ribbons in red, white and blue saying, "Support Our Troops Athletes." Were there huge, unsold surpluses? But I digress.

Other world leaders, of course, aren't attending. Gordon Brown of the UK will attend the closing ceremony to pick up the torch, which is headed next for London. Germany's Angela Merkel will not attend. France's Nicolas Sarkozy was thinking about it, until China told him not to bother. It goes without saying that the Dalai Lama isn't attending.

The reaction to the announcement, to no one's surprise, was negative:

The White House announcement drew a rebuke from officials at Save Darfur, a nonprofit organization that accuses China, Sudan’s biggest trading partner, of failing to use its influence to stop fighting between rebels and militias in Darfur, where at least 200,000 people have been killed, according to published mortality surveys, and 2.5 million have been driven from their homes in what the White House terms a genocide.

“We are deeply disappointed,” the coalition’s president, Jerry Fowler, said.

On Capitol Hill, some lawmakers, led by two representatives — Neil Abercrombie, Democrat of Hawaii, and Dana Rohrabacher, Republican of California — have urged a boycott of the Games. In a telephone interview from California, Mr. Rohrabacher accused the president of timing the announcement so that reaction from members of Congress would be muted.

“I think that a president who has said we are conducting warfare in different parts of the world in order to promote democracy and human rights loses credibility when he announces that he is going to attend the opening ceremonies of the Olympics in a country that is the world’s worst human rights abuser,” Mr. Rohrabacher said.

And what, you might want to ask, is attendance by the Athlete in Chief designed to tell the world? That the US is a wholly owned, corporate subsidiary of Wal-mart Beijing? That Disney-ification is more important than human suffering? That Human Rights is a meme the US will claim to invade and kill for, but only when there's oil or some other economic reason? That the Athlete in Chief remains a petulant fratboy who wants to go to the party, and that's all there is to it?

Personally, I'm ever so slightly outraged. I don't have to stand for this. Nor do you. The Fourth of July isn't about hiding and being sneeky. It's about independence and, dare I say it, human rights. Let's celebrate. Let's get out those credit cards and make lots and lots of small donations to organizations who really need our help to respond to this embarrassing set back:

Save Darfur

International Campaign For Tibet

Human Rights Watch

On Mothers' Day Protests In Kathmandu

Mothers' Day isn't celebrated in Nepal. Modern Mothers' Day began as Women's Day of Peace. So it's a synchronicity that hundreds of Tibetan women in Kathmandu including Buddhist nuns chose today as an all-woman protest against Chinese occupation of Tibet.

Reuters reports:

Nepali police detained 562 Tibetan women at an anti-China rally in Kathmandu on Sunday, the first all-women protest against Chinese rule in their homeland, officials said.

Some shouted "We want free Tibet" while others wept as they were dragged along the road to police vans and trucks and driven to detention centers. Many were wearing black armbands and had their mouths gagged with cloths.

Nepal considers Tibet part of China, a key donor and trade partner, and has been cracking down on protests by the exiled Tibetans against Beijing.

Police said the protesters would be freed later.

Nepal borders Tibet. More than 20,000 Tibetans have been living in Nepal since fleeing their homeland after the recent failed uprising and China's crack-down.

"We are not against Nepal. Our protests are against China. So why are they arresting us?" asked a 70-year-old protester who gave her name as Chinjhoke, tears rolling down her face.

According to BBC Nepal

cannot allow Tibetans to demonstrate because it recognises Tibet as an integral part of China.

But the UN says the mass arrests are against the spirit of a society governed by the rule of law.

Today's protest in Kathmandu followed yesterday's in which

A group of Tibetan protesters chained themselves together in front of the Chinese Embassy's visa office in Nepal's capital, Kathmandu, on Saturday.

Sixteen protesters secured themselves to each other with chains and padlocks at the Chinese embassy in the heart of Kathmandu, and were joined by dozens of other Tibetans who chanted 'Free Tibet' and 'We want freedom.'

Police official Ramesh Thapa says 120 people were detained for defying a ban on demonstrations against China, Nepal's neighbour to the north.

I don't think it can be argued that arrests for that reason comply with an acknowledgement of human rights. Evidently, it's important to Nepal to mimic Chinese responses to peaceful protest.

I watch all of this with increasing frustration. I am astonished by the courage of the Tibetan protesters, that they risk so much to bring to the world's attention their grievances about the occupation of Tibet. But I don't believe that what they do will result in action that will change things. That belief brings me despair.

All I have to offer is this Metta prayer:

May all beings be well and safe, may they be at ease.

Whatever living beings there may be, whether moving or standing still, without exception, whether large, great, middling, or small, whether tiny or substantial,

Whether seen or unseen, whether living near or far,

Born or unborn; may all beings be happy.

Let none deceive or despise another anywhere. Let none wish harm to another, in anger or in hate.”

Just as a mother would guard her child, her only child, with her own life, even so let me cultivate a boundless mind for all beings in the world.

Let me cultivate a boundless love for all beings in the world, above, below, and across, unhindered, without ill will or enmity.

Standing, walking, seated, or lying down, free from torpor, let me as far as possible fix my attention on this recollection. This, they say, is the divine life right here.

May it be so.

Olympics Stifles Athletes' Free Speech

The IOC (the "International Olympic Committee"), the group that runs the Olympics, has figured out how to prevent participating athletes from demonstrating for Tibetan freedom and displeasing their Chinese hosts. The age old tactic: a "chilling effect" on free speech.

It's relatively simple: the IOC tells athletes that they have a right to free speech, but they don't have the right to make "propaganda." IOC won't define line between the two. But if an athlete so much as steps even with one toe into the latter, s/he's out. of. here. Goodbye. Put simply, the IOC doesn't need explicitly to forbid certain kinds of free speech. It can accomplish the same, desired result by harshly and intentionally chilling it.

A definition of "chilling effect":

A chilling effect is a term in United States law that describes a situation where speech or conduct is suppressed or limited by fear of penalization at the hands of an individual or group.

And that, folks, is precisely what's going on with athletes' free speech at the Beijing Olympics.

The Times reports:

Athletes who display Tibetan flags at Olympic venues — including in their own rooms — could be expelled from this summer’s Games in Beijing under anti-propaganda rules.

Jacques Rogge, the president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), said that competitors were free to express their political views but faced sanctions if they indulged in propaganda.

Got that? Expression of political views: good. Indulging in propaganda: bad.

But, you're asking, is there a difference between the two? How does one know if one is expressing free speech or propagandizing? What's the difference?

The question of what will constitute propaganda when the Games are on in August and what will be considered opinion under IOC rules is one vexing many in the Olympic movement. The Olympic Charter bans any kind of “demonstration or political, religious or racial propaganda” in any Olympic venue or area. /snip

The IOC did not specify whether a Chinese athlete or a foreign competitor of Tibetan origin flying the Tibetan flag would be regarded as patriotic or propagandist. A spokeswoman said that there had been no discussion internally or with the Chinese authorities about use of the Tibetan national flag. Asked whether athletes would be allowed to hang the flag in their rooms, she said: “The village is an Olympic venue so it falls under the same rules and regulations of any venue which would mean that anything in there would be judged on whether it was a provocative propaganda initiative.”

The fact that the IOC has still not qualified the exact interpretation of “propaganda” means that some athletes remain confused about what they can say during the 16-day event without being sent home or stripped of a medal.

Unfurling Free Tibet banners or wearing Save Darfur T-shirts at Olympic venues are acts likely to be regarded as a breach of the charter, which was introduced after the American athletes Tommie Smith and John Carlos gave the Black Power salute on the podium at the 1968 Games in Mexico City.

So, as of right now, there's no official definition of what constitutes "propaganda" and how propaganda might be distinguished from "free speech."

The consequences of uttering or otherwise expressing "propaganda," however, are quite dire. This means that as things stand now, there is an enormous "chilling effect" repressing legitimate, free speech.

No athlete who has trained for his/her entire life is going to jeopardize participation in the Olympics by testing the definition of "propaganda" by hanging a Tibetan flag in a dorm room, by waving the flag on a victory lap, by speaking out about Tibet to the press, by showing a picture of the Dalai Lama, by wearing Tibetan malas, by wearing a Tibet hat or headband or t-shirt. Why? Because that might be considered to be propaganda by the IOC and an automatic ticket home.

So far, the IOC has been very much China's lap dog. As the Times reported:

A spokeswoman said that there had been no discussion internally or with the Chinese authorities about use of the Tibetan national flag.

You might wonder what this question of definition in the IOC rules has to do with China. In fact, it has everything to do with it. The IOC does not dare to step on China's sensitivities about the topic. In these circumstances, the message to athletes is incredibly simple. STFU about Tibet. Or go home. Free speech be damned.

The IOC doesn't need to enact a gag rule for its athletes. That would be assailed as a "prior restraint" on free speech. No, when the stakes are this high, a harsh "chilling effect" accomplishes precisely the same goal. So much for the so-called "Olympic ideal."

Free Tibet!

The spontaneous demonstrations by monks in March seem to have triggered demonstrations across the world in support of religious freedom and autonomy for Tibet.

We've been treated to huge street demonstrations in London, Paris, and San Francisco. To extinguishing the torch in Paris. To Chinese security pushing around Sebastian Coe, who was a fantastic runner in his prime. To mountain climbers hanging flags on the Golden Gate Bridge. To demonstrations in Lhasa. To news items about the struggles of Tibet. Let a thousand flowers bloom.

But if Tibet is to be saved, and I truly hope that it will be despite fifty years of Chinese domination and oppression, if it is to be preserved in a form we can recognize, it seems only right that it should be saved by what are essentially Tibetan, nonviolent means.

My simple proposal has two items:

1. Please donate some $$ to International Campaign For Tibet. This is the Internet so large donations aren't required. If you give $5 or $10, and millions join you, it will help in a dramatic way. You don't need to strain to help. Anyone can help. There is no minimum amount.

2. Please sit quietly (eyes open or closed). Then, non-denominationally and/or theistically and/or untheistically, however you are most comfortable, inhale the suffering and oppression of all of the Tibetans, and then exhale out in place of their suffering and oppression, strong love and healing to all involved in the conflict, including the Chinese government. Repeat this over and over again until you are finished. This is called tonglen and is a wonderful and powerful practice for making peace. When you are finished with "tonglen", you may conclude by saying the following:

May all beings be happy.
May all beings be well.
May all beings be safe,
And may any merit from this practice go to the ocean of merit created by the Buddhas for the enlightenment of all sentient beings.

This is a road to saving Tibet. May Tibet be free.