From the News Desk of Tibetan Review, Delhi
As China appears to have embarked on an all-out verbal assault on the Dalai Lama led by its hardline Tibet Autonomous Region party boss and Hu Jintao protégé Mr Zhang Qingli, its united front tactic of establishing a support base within the exile Tibetan community has apparently been brought into play recently. Those at the centre of the focus are people of little or no consequence within the exile community, inasmuch as they are members of a couple or so of related families living their own personal lives in Switzerland. The reason for their newfound patriotism towards China remains unclear as they have so far been very shy of clearing themselves up publicly.
However, China’s official Xinhua news agency Aug 24 did say that a group of “patriotic” Tibetans living in Europe met Jul 24 in Beijing with the head of the United Front Work Department of the Communist Party of China Central Committee, Ms Liu Yandong. “The motherland always welcomes patriotic Tibetans,” the report quoted Liu as saying, adding, “The Party and the country will always trust and care for you and for all patriotic Tibetans”.
The report said the group was on a 10-day visit beginning Jul 23 in Beijing, although it was not stated whether it was going to Tibet. No names were mentioned in that report.
What particularly riled a section of exile Tibetans was a report Jul 28 carried on the website of China’s official China Central Television (CCTV)-as well as in many other official Chinese newspapers, radio broadcasts and websites from Jul 25 to 28-which said that Swiss-based “living Buddhas” Koondhor Jewon Tulku and Khanang Jam-yang Ten-pen-yima, who led the delegation, had expressed support for China’s unity and determination to fight against Tibetan separatism during their meeting with officials from the United Front Work Department of the Communist Party of China. The website of the United Front Department (www.zytzb.cn) carried a photo of the meeting.
Although there has been no official response from the exile Tibetan government, which is still in the mode of creating a congenial atmosphere for continuing an ongoing dialogue with Beijing, the Dharamsala-based Tibet Youth Congress (TYC), which is dedicated to fighting for Tibet’s complete independence, called a press conference on Aug 8, denouncing the Chinese media propaganda as being out of tune with the desire and aspiration of the exile Tibetan community as a whole, and, especially, with that of Tibetans living in Europe. TYC President Mr Kelsang Phuntsok wanted Tibetans in Europe to take a clear position on whether the so-called delegation of Tibetans in Europe really could or did represent them.
In particular, the TYC wanted the delegates to clarify whether the CCTV report of Jul 28 saying they had expressed determination to fight Tibetan separatism and praised the Qinghai-Tibet Railway project as being a great boost for their confidence in Tibet’s future were true.
Koondor and Jamyang are said to be among the few Tibetans who the Chinese embassy in the Swiss capital Berne last year took to Spain to greet Chinese President Hun Jintao, who was on a three-nation tour of Europe. To the TYC, this was particularly significant in view of the fact that a crime-against-humanity-in-Tibet case had been instituted against seven top retired Chinese leaders in the Spanish court in Jun 2006. That is why, it said, the Tibetans were taken to greet Hu not in Switzerland or Germany-which also he visited during his Sep-Oct 2005 tour-but in Spain.
According to sources within the exile Tibetan community, the wives of Koondhor and Jamyang are sisters. Also in the delegation were a woman named Tsamla and her husband, Phuntsok Tsering. The rest of the delegation, said to probably number as much as 20, are reportedly relatives of these persons. Tsamla is said to be sister of Tsultrim Tersey, also settled in Switzerland and who in 1979 (Apr-May) became the first Tibetan refugee to visit Tibet on a Chinese travel document. (This should not, by any means, be taken to imply that Tsultrim is also, somehow, complicit in the current delegation-hobnobbing. In fact, a detailed account of his visit appearing in the Jun 1979 edition of Tibetan Review shows him to be as pro-Tibetan as one can be.) Jamyang is said to have once worked at the photo studio of the exile Tibetan government’s information and international relations department, earning the nickname of Parkhang (photo studio) Rinpoche.
Ms Liu is the head of the party department that has been talking with the envoys of the Dalai Lama since 2002.
