We will use the year between now and the 2008 Beijing Olympics to draw attention to the situation in Tibet, and we want a separate Tibetan team to compete in the games, says Chungdak Koren, right, Chairwoman of the Norwegian Tibet Committee, one of the organisations at the Human Rights House in Oslo. (10-AUG-07)
Based on an article by Sissel Henriksen in the Norwegian newspaper Klassekampen, this article has been translated and prepared for publication by HRH F / Niels Jacob Harbitz. Photo of Koren: Harbitz. Photo of Lama: Silja Nordahl, the Norwegian Helsinki Committee.
Tibetans around the world are these days stepping up their campaigns leading up to the 2008 Summer Olympics, to take place in Beijing, the People´s Republic of China, in August 2008. The campaigners want maximum attention towards the human rights situation in the People´s Republic of China and Tibet.
Chinese troups took control over Tibet in 1951. Ever since, the country has been occupied and ruled by Chinese authorities, who, on their part, claim that Tibet has ‘always’ been Chinese territory, a claim that Tibetan independence activists naturally dismiss.
-One world, one dream: A free Tibet in 2008
This week, Wednesday 8 August, it was exactly one year to the opening of the 2008 Beijing games. The day did not go unnoticed. In India, USA and Australia, among other places, there were big demonstrations. On Tuesday, eight human rights activists lowered themselves off from the Chinese wall and unfoleded a banner reading ‘One world, one dream: A free Tibet in 2008’. The activists, from Great Britain, Canada and the US, were arrested and expelled from the People´s Republic of China. In Norway, there are only 45 Tibetans, but the Norwegian Tibet Committee has 1400 members, and marked the start of its campaign with a stand in the capital Oslo last Saturday. They will also participate in a Mini Marathon, also in Oslo, 30 September.
No boycott
-We do not encourage a boycot of the Beijing games, says Koren. -Instead, we have launched the campaign ‘Tibet to the Olympics’. Exile Tibetans from many different countries have formed Tibet’s own national Olympic Committee, and submitted an application to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to be represented with a team of their own next year. So far, 12 Tibetan athletes have come forward as possible participants in such a team. All exile Tibetans, the 12 are active in different sports in their respective countries of residence.
Tibetans highlights that it appears to be very important to the People´s Republic of China that next year’s Olympics becomes a success, but are also of the opinion that instead of using the games as an occason to do something about the country’s very severe human rights situation, Beijing has opted to use its PR resources to cover up all controversial areas of the country’s policies. -Unless the People´s Republic of China enters into a meaningful dialogue with Dalai Lama about Tibet’s political future, the glossy picture that the People´s Republic of China wants to make out of next year’s Beijing games will be overshadowed by the ongoing occupation and the human rights violations that come with it in Tibet, says the Norwegian Tibet Committee in a press release.
It’s getting worse
In 2001, when Beijing was appointed host of the 2008 Summer Games, it was said that the years leading up tp the games would be used to improve the human rights situation in Tibet. Instead, we have seen a deterioration of the situation, says Koren. A key demand of the Tibetan community inside and out of Tibet is to know the whereabouts of Panchen Lama, the boy who has been identified as the reincarnation of their second highest religious leader. Traditionally, it is religious leaders who decide who the reincarnation of Dalai Lama and Panchen Lama is. The boy that Tibetans had identified as Panchen Lama disappeared in 1995, and Tibetans’ demand to Chinese authorities is to know his destiny.
-If still alive, Panchen Lama is now 18 years old. In his place, the People´s Republic of China has identified another Panchen Lama, says Koren. Tibetans are also disgusted by last week’s announcement by Chinese authorities that they shall have the exclusive right to approve who slahh be the next Dalai Lama and Panchen Lama. -This is a very severe violation of the freedom of religion, says Koren.
Second class citizens
Since 1951, Tibet has been annexed and included in the People’s Republic of China. Following an uprising in the Tibetan capital Lhasa in 1959, Tibet’s head of state and prime religious leader Dalai Lama, right, escaped to India where he still resides. Today, 135.000 Tibetans live in exile. Dalai Lama leads an exile government from India, and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989. Koren says that it is the exile communities who have done best at protecting and conserving Tibetan culture and religion. -Those who live in Tibet have been subjected to an intense campaign of ‘chinesefication,’ in which the Tibetan language is removed from all public arenas, including bureacracy, education and general public life. Following the opening of the new railway into Tibet last year, the immigration of ethnic Chinese into Tibet has gained momentum, to the point where Tibetans are now second class citizens in their own country, reduced to being the minority group in all cities. Even if the People´s Republic of China has done a lo to develop Tibet, this development has only to a very limited degree benefitted Tibetans. Tibet is still the poorest part of the People’s Republic of China, and has the highest rates of both illiteracy and infant mortality.
