China to Mark Defeat of Tibet Uprising
With the 50th anniversary of the failed Tibetan uprising approaching in March, and with memories of last year’s riots still fresh, Chinese leaders in Beijing have opted this year to mark the occasion by naming a “Serf Liberation Day.” From AP:
A holiday to mark the “emancipation of millions of serfs and slaves” in Tibet will be decided on during a meeting of the region’s legislature starting Wednesday, Xinhua News Agency said.
The entry of Chinese forces into Tibet in 1949 was followed by efforts to transform the Buddhist, feudal order into a socialist, secular society. Tibetans rebelled on March 10, 1959, to try an oust the Chinese, but the uprising ended after 20 days with the flight of the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan spiritual leader, into exile in India.
A bill to decide on a holiday marking those events will be presented during the second annual session of the ninth Tibet Regional People’s Congress, Xinhua said.
The bill is aimed at “reminding all the Chinese people, including Tibetans, of the landmark democratic reform initiated 50 years ago,” Pang Boyong, deputy secretary general of the Tibetan regional congress standing committee, said Saturday, according to the report.
Meanwhile, McClatchy profiles Gyalwang Karmapa, the third-highest lama in the Tibetan religious order, who has been mentioned as a possible transition leader after the death of the Dalai Lama:
The Karmapa is the first Tibetan Buddhist reincarnation to be recognized by both the Dalai Lama and Communist Party authorities of China. He made headlines in January 2000, at age 14, with his flight from Chinese-ruled Tibet into exile, traveling by foot and horseback, then by jeep and helicopter to India. Allegations of espionage, intrigue involving a forgotten amulet and squabbling within a monastery marked his early years in India.
Exuding self-assuredness, the solidly built, 6-foot-tall Karmapa received several foreign journalists in a rare interview over the weekend at the university that’s his temporary home near the mountain headquarters of the Dalai Lama. The Karmapa talked of his love of music, his future role for Tibetan Buddhists and the lack of human rights in China.
He criticized the Chinese government, which he said wanted “to create this ethnic conflict” that exploded in deadly rioting in Tibet in March. However, he spoke tenderly of the Chinese.
“Since I am born as a Tibetan, I really care about the Tibetan people and Tibetan community. At the same time, I also love the Chinese,” he said.
Read about the controversy over the selection of the Karmapa via Wikipedia. See also CDT’s coverage of last year’s riots in Tibet.
POSTED COMMENTS: 6 Responses
These guys are incredible…
They dare spit right into the Tibetans’ faces…
Hu Jintao is a real joker – claiming to build a harmonious society while recklessly fomenting unrest in Tibet…
In a possibly related outcry, even some Chinese (at least the ones with a brain of their own) are calling foul. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7824255.stm
An old saying I heard while traveling in China: “If you tell a lie 100 times, it becomes truth.”
Serf Liberation Day will not “remind” the Chinese poeple, it will “indoctrinate” them because they will hear and read it 100 times.
“If you tell a lie 100 times, it becomes truth.”
That is trully sick and disturbing. What kind of world would we live in if we all practiced that kind of culture? Though, it probably would not matter because the human race would go extinct from all out war, both civil and world wars.
Yes, SR, it is disturbing, but this is a basic tenet of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The CCP feeds all kind of “propaganda” ( = lies) to the people. Go deeper into the Chinese government and you will see this time and time again, daily in fact with huge propaganda departments in China. sad, but true.
“China hater”? In a way maybe…but not because I hate China. It is the colonial tactics/policies in Tibet at the hands of the Han controled PRC that we Tibetans hate. Behind all the anger, frustration and sadness caused by the cultural oppression at the hands of the PRC colonialists is the simple peaceful minded Tibetan wishing that the Chinese would once again be happy in China and the Tibetans can be happy in Tibet.