US pays tribute to Dalai Lama’s warriors
Sify News (India)
September 16, 2010
Hundreds of Tibetan warriors who doggedly fought a 15-year guerrilla war against the Chinese in Tibet after being trained and armed by the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) now have a memorial that is likely to ruffle Beijing.
The US has, for the first time, paid a tribute to the resistance forces and acknowledged the CIA’s role in training them as the agency is erecting a memorial plaque at Camp Hale, a training base in Colorado for US troops during World War II.
Unknown to the local residents, who were told it was an atomic testing site, Camp Hale served as a training camp for nearly 2,000 Tibetan warriors who were taught the art of guerrilla warfare by the CIA from 1957 to 1972 to fight China’s People’s Liberation Army that attacked Tibet in 1949 and annexed the Buddhist kingdom within two years.
The event last week saw former CIA agents, Tibetans involved in the operation, and representatives of the US Forest Service and the Tibetan-American community in Colorado gather at Camp Hale.
The plaque reads: ‘From 1958 to 1964, Camp Hale played an important role as a training site for Tibetan Freedom Fighters. Trained by the CIA, many of these brave men lost their lives in the struggle for freedom. ‘They were the best and bravest of their generation, and we wept together when they were killed fighting alongside their countrymen.’ This plaque is dedicated to their memory.’
When China attacked Tibet under Mao Zedong, the American government, regarding Beijing as a potential exporter of communism and threat to US allies and interests in the region, trained Tibetans and air-dropped them into occupied Tibet.
The guerrillas also had the support of the Indian government. Some of them operated from Mustang, Nepal’s northernmost district sharing the border with Tibet.
‘Like many CIA operations, the US involvement with Tibetan guerrillas, including the training programme at Camp Hale, has not officially been acknowledged by the US government previously,’ said the New York-based International Campaign for Tibet (ICT).
‘The history of this era is increasingly being written about by academics, journalists, and those who participated in it, both Tibetan and American.’
‘We commend Senator (Mark) Udall for his lead in the US Congress and for working with the US Forest Service to provide proper recognition of the historic US support rendered in the name of Tibetan freedom and the heroism demonstrated by many Tibetans who fought for their country,’ said Todd Stein, director of government relations at the ICT.
But the tribute is bound to ruffle the feathers of Beijing that still remains suspicious of Mustang, regarding it as a base from where the ‘Free Tibet’ movement could start again and has begun a campaign in Nepal to intensify patrolling along the border.
Beijing has also prevented efforts by the US to offer asylum to Tibetan refugees in Nepal who are especially vulnerable to Chinese attempts to have them deported.
The Tibetan resistance ended after Tibetan ruler Dalai Lama, who fled to India in 1959, sent a
message to the warriors, asking for an end to it.

Chinese Leaders Need Bold Vision and Courage
to Resolve the Issue of Tibet: Special Envoy
By Lodi Gyaltsen Gyari
South China Morning Post
September 12, 2010
In an op-ed published in the South China Morning Post, Special Envoy of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Kasur Lodi Gyaltsen Gyari, expressed hope that the present Chinese leadership will seize the opportunity and have the courage to confront the difficult truths of contemporary Tibet, reflecting the kind of boldness of vision shown by Deng Xiaoping and Hu Yaobang.
I have spent much of the past three decades representing His Holiness the Dalai Lama in talks with Chinese leaders. Through these many years of intermittent dialogue, I have sought to make the Chinese leadership understand the will of the Tibetan people and the vision of His Holiness in finding a common road to peace and reconciliation.
Over the years, I have also witnessed a drastic change in the nature and structure of Chinese leadership – from the sweeping boldness of the Deng Xiaoping era to the statesmanship and broad-mindedness of Hu Yaobang , to the institutional constraints and lack of assertiveness in recent years.
When there was a visionary leadership, we could see that China was able to take steps that helped preserve the unity and integrity of the country, promoting the interests of all its citizens and creating a positive international image.
The attitude of the Chinese leadership to the Tibetan issue has a direct bearing on the building of a harmonious society in China and its image on the world stage.
As part of my work I have tried to understand the reasons behind the current attitude of the Chinese leadership, and can think of three possible mindsets. The first one is the view that China is rising and all ethnic peoples need to modify their individual aspirations to fit in with this new identity.
The holders of this viewpoint in China seem to disregard and undermine the distinct identity of the Tibetan people. Beijing seems to mistake the artificial stability in Tibetan areas as a sign of Tibetan acquiescence. But this is not the quiet of complacency or contentment. Rather, it is the silence of growing desperation and bitterness – the kind that multiplies under repressive conditions. It is, frankly, the kind of silence in which the seeds of future violence and instability are sown.
The second mindset is that if the Chinese authorities are successful in improving economic conditions in the Tibetan areas, the Tibetan people’s concerns will be addressed and the whole issue will go away.
This is, again, a very narrow approach to resolving the Tibetan problem. The economic marginalisation of the Tibetan people is a reality that the Chinese leadership needs to address, given that official statistics place the Tibetans at the low end of the scale of economic development.
However, as Chinese scholars and experts on the Tibetan issue know, Tibetans have a high regard for their distinct culture, which has made a positive contribution to the development of the new China.
This cultural and spiritual identity needs to be given space to flourish and prosper among the Tibetan people. That cannot be achieved solely through economic development, however well intentioned it may be.
Economic integration without any respect and sensitivity for their culture will lead to more resentment by the Tibetan people. This was the clear message that the Chinese authorities should have received from the 2008 protests all over the Tibetan areas.
The third mindset is that China should wait until the passing away of the present Dalai Lama, when the Tibetan issue will naturally disappear. This thinking is based on the belief that a leaderless and disoriented movement would fragment into pieces and eventually become irrelevant.
This is a misplaced mindset for many reasons, and very counterproductive to China’s own future. Those who subscribe to this view do not understand that fragmentation today no longer means irrelevance; it means radical unpredictability and vastly greater risk. Far from fading away, the Tibetan political movement will reinvent itself in the absence of the current, Fourteenth Dalai Lama, and become something far more complex and unmanageable in the process.
It is disheartening to see just how far China’s leaders have drifted from the early days of bold reform. The leaders I came to know in the early 1980s shared a conviction about their historic role in bringing about the difficult transition that was needed in post-Mao China. Leaders like Hu Yaobang understood that the greatness of China’s future lay in the responsible actions of its leaders to conduct the necessary groundwork for true stability. Hu called for courageous policies relating to Tibet. Because he was open
and honest, dared to act, dared to face reality and dared to bear responsibility, he won the hearts of the Tibetan people.
It is my hope that today’s leaders will seize the opportunity and have the courage to confront the difficult truths of contemporary Tibet, reflecting the kind of boldness of vision shown by Deng and Hu.
For our part, we have formally clarified His Holiness’ position in the Memorandum on Genuine Autonomy for the Tibetan People, presented at the Eighth Round of talks in November 2008. Through the Memorandum and the related Note, presented in January this year, we have stated in clear and definitive terms that we seek only genuine autonomy within the framework of the People’s Republic of China, its constitution and its laws.
We have made it abundantly clear that we will respect the People’s Republic of China’s core interest of sovereignty and territorial integrity, including respecting the authority of the central government and adhering to the regional, national autonomy system.
But the central government must also fully respect the legitimate rights of the Tibetan people to maintain our distinctive and unique identity, as this is our core interest.
The Chinese leadership needs to take responsibility and make a serious commitment to finding a real solution to the issue of Tibet. The urgency of that responsibility is all the more palpable because of the uniqueness of this current window of time. Never before has there been a Tibetan leader like His Holiness, who has so firmly and persistently pursued such a challenging and treacherous path to achieve visionary change for the Tibetan and Chinese peoples.
The PRC proclaimed itself a multi-ethnic state with all nationalities having equal power and rights, rather than a state where a majority has political dominance over the minority.
China’s leaders have a historic choice to make: will they steward China towards a peaceful future in which Tibetans finally find a sustainable home within such a modern Chinese state? Or will they look the other way as the seeds of alienation are sown, with negative consequences for the distant future?
I know His Holiness the Dalai Lama has chosen the right side of history. I can only hope China’s leaders will see fit to do the same.
-Lodi Gyaltsen Gyari is the Special Envoy of the Dalai Lama and head of the Tibetan negotiations
team in the talks with the Chinese leadership

Tibet: Tibetans wait for Dalai Lama, cling to culture
Chinese government policy and population trends have many
Tibetans worried that their culture might be dying.
Keith B. Richburg
The Washington Post
September 8, 2010
TONGREN (Amdo Labrang) — In China, the Dalai Lama is officially a dangerous separatist and a “criminal,” and his supporters are prohibited from discussing him or even displaying his picture. But here in the ethnic Tibetan areas of Qinghai province, nominally autonomous while under strict Chinese control, the exiled spiritual leader remains a ubiquitous presence, despite his long physical absence.
The Dalai Lama’s beaming visage gazes down from the temple altars of Buddhist monasteries. His likeness adorns a popular artist’s workshop and a small convenience store selling bottled soft drinks, beer and snacks.
And everywhere, it seems, the fervent wish is that the Dalai Lama might return soon, to help save the Tibetan language and culture that many believe could soon be overwhelmed by the presence of China’s ethnic Han majority. Even the Tibetans’ centuries-old tradition of herding yak, cattle and sheep across the Tibetan plateau’s grasslands appears threatened as Chinese officials move increasing numbers of semi-nomadic herdsmen into “resettlement towns,” where jobs are scarce.
“We long for the Dalai Lama to come back, to solve the issue of religious freedom and to help Tibetan culture come back,” said Gen Ga, a 24-year-old monk at a monastery in nearby Wutong village. “If we look ahead 10 or 20 years, if the Dalai Lama fails to come back, I do think Tibetan culture will die.”
A three-day trip through the ethnic Tibetan areas of Qinghai province, where the Dalai Lama was born, showed that the Beijing government’s efforts to vilify the revered leader have had no discernible effect. When government inspectors come, many Tibetans said, they usually get advance notice, and they simply hide or cover the Dalai Lama’s photo.
The vilification efforts escalated after the Tibetan areas, including this province, exploded in rioting in March 2008, the most serious resistance to Chinese rule in decades. Thousands of monks and others were arrested, and outside groups, including Human Rights Watch, accused the government of systematically abusing detainees while looking for evidence that the Dalai Lama was responsible for the unrest.
Chinese officials have strongly denied those allegations and said authorities operated lawfully to maintain order. “The judicial rights of the defendants were fully guaranteed, as well as their ethnic customs and personal dignity,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said in July in response to Human Rights Watch’s allegations.
Here in Tongren, a monk in his 30s who said he participated in three protests in March 2008 said he was detained for six months after the riots, describing how he was suspended from the ceiling, beaten repeatedly and tortured with electric rods.
The monk, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals, said the beatings ended only when he agreed to make a videotaped denunciation of the Dalai Lama.
“They made me agree to a confession saying all the things I did was because I got instructions from the Dalai Lama,” the monk said. He said he believes he was singled out because of his support for a group of 13 monks who drafted a 2007 proposal calling for the preservation of Tibetan language and culture.
The monk’s account accords with those by scores of others who were interviewed for the Human Rights Watch report. “When the monks were tortured in detention, it was often because they refused to denounce the Dalai Lama,” said Nicholas Bequelin, the China researcher for Hong Kong-based Human Rights Watch.
“There is no doubt that many Chinese state policies are aimed at diluting or reshaping Tibetan traditional culture in a way that is innocuous to the state,” Bequelin said.
The main repositories of Tibetan Buddhist culture are the monasteries – which were also the source of the 2008 uprising – and the government has since attempted to increase its control over them, setting up “management committees” to ensure that the senior monks toe the correct political line.
Chinese official media reported last month that Du Qinglin, chief of the Communist Party’s United Front Work Department, which oversees Tibet policy, said monasteries must take the lead in “anti-separatist struggles.”
For many Tibetans, the front line in the cultural struggle is linguistic. Some complained that even in the supposedly autonomous prefectures of Qinghai, signs in Chinese outnumber those in Tibetan. In government offices, Tibetans say, they are forced to speak Chinese. And they worry that Tibetan is not being taught in schools on an equal footing with Chinese.
One of the most hotly debated government policies, among Tibetans and outside experts, is the effort to induce herdsmen to give up their nomadic lifestyle on the grasslands and resettle in rows of brick houses in newly built towns.
Officials and some outside experts say the effort is needed to tackle poverty and to stop over-grazing of the grasslands. But most of the herdsmen are illiterate, and there are few jobs in the resettlement towns.
Some who have been resettled have returned to the nomadic life, but often while keeping older relatives and children in the towns to be closer to medical care and schools.
“It was pretty hard to find a job there,” said Gartsang Cerang, 36, who lived in the resettlement town of Dowa before returning to the grasslands three months ago. “Life in the town was pretty hard.” He has to start over now – he has only half a dozen yak and two sheep and lives in a tent with his daughter Nam Turji, 17. He left two children, ages 13 and 14, in town.
Marjo Herji, 30, said many of the herdsmen on the mountainside overlooking Qinghai Lake have left to work in the tourist shops. But she said she and her husband plan to stay. “It’s hard for us to do any other job. We don’t have any special skills,” she said, churning yak milk into butter with a hand-cranked machine.
But she left her daughter in the village so the girl can attend first grade and she hopes her daughter does not follow in the herder’s life. “It’s better for her to become a literate person,” she said.
China is developing Qinghai Lake as a major attraction for Chinese tourists, and some Tibetans have found jobs shuttling visitors in electric golf carts, renting local costumes or letting tourists pose for photographs with rare white yaks. But they say the pay is scant and the tourist season short. Life on the grasslands is hard, too, they say, but they could sustain themselves with their herds.
It is difficult to see how even a political settlement that allowed the Dalai Lama to return could reverse some of the trends underway on the Tibetan Plateau, but according to Barry Sautman, a Tibet expert at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, “if he were there, he could have quite a bit of influence with the central government.”
Tibetans are hopeful – and waiting.
Staff researcher Wang Juan contributed to this report.

Tibetan government fears infiltration by Chinese agents: report

Phayul
September 8, 2010

Dharamsala, Sept 8 — The security wing of Tibetan Government-in-Exile has cautioned the Indian security and intelligence agencies of anticipated attempts by China to infiltrate its band of army trained undercover agents in the town, a media report said Tuesday.

Security department in its communication to Crime Investigation Department of state police anticipated Chinese infiltration in Tibetan settlements clustered across India in the garb of monks, the report said.

“Necessary steps are being taken in wake of anticipation of Tibetan administration,” Hindustan Times quoted Superintendent of Police, Dr Atul Fulzele, as saying.

Security of the exiled Tibetan leader the Dalai Lama the centre of concern.

Effective steps have been taken to upgrade security of Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, Fulzele added.

Police has also reportedly asked Ministry of External Affairs to provide funds for installing chemical detector at Dalai Lama’s residential complex.

Dalai Lama’s has three tier security manned by Himachal Police. Internal security is looked after close protection group of Tibetans. More than 150 men are deployed for round the clock security of Dalai Lama’s palace.

According to the report, Tibetan government’s fear stems from the from the fact that two months ago, a Chinese woman was arrested in McLeod Ganj town for staying without valid documents.

The woman named Chai Sha Hung was deported to her hometown last month.

The Indian police suspected her of being a spy but the claims could not be established, the report said.

Citing sources in the Tibetan government, the report said Chinese intelligence agencies were keeping track about the activities of Tibetan government and Non Government Organization that are at fore front of campaign to secure freedom for Chinese occupied-Tibet.

“Chinese government has become more wary of the Tibetans after protest scattered across Tibet ahead of Beijing Olympics” a senior official of Tibetan security said.

Local police arrested a Chinese man named Liu Xia in 2008. Intelligence gathering confirmed Xia had served Peoples Liberation Army. Information gathered by Indian intelligence revealed that Liu had visited Dharamsala twice before protest spread in Tibet.

What came to the surprise of Intelligence agencies was Liu mobile phone details which confirmed that he was in touch with high ranking military official in Lhasa. Xia has reportedly revealed that he had come by road from Lhasa, and later reached Delhi after traveling through Nepal illegally.

In the wake of renewed qualms of Tibetan government, local police has stepped up vigil on Tibetan escapees, although their numbers have decreased drastically ever since China tightened security on its borders.

“We have sent an advisory to all the Tibetan welfare officer asking them to educate Tibetans about the possible infiltration of Chinese monks ” said a Tibetan security official requesting anonymity.

Police have also reportedly advised the Tibetan leader to maintain a particular distance while meeting the new entrants at his palace. The Dalai Lama routinely meets the Tibetan exiles and well-wishers in his residence.