DHARAMSHALA, June 22: The exile Tibetan administration on Friday dismissed allegations made by a delegation of communist party leaders from the so-called Tibet Autonomous Region during its recent visit to the United States of America.
Members of China’s rubberstamp National People’s Congress from TAR, led by Padma Choling, on Thursday said the ongoing wave of self-immolations in Tibet were “criminal acts premeditated, plotted and manipulated by overseas separatist forces.”
The Dharamshala based Central Tibetan Administration strongly rejected the “false claims,” saying that the “unfounded allegations” made by the delegation “are unlikely to provide convincing evidence to change the U.S. authorities’ position on Tibet.”
“The U.S. government and Congress have unequivocally stated that they deplore the Chinese government’s repressive policies targeting Tibetans and have repeatedly called on the Chinese government to suspend its counter-productive policies implemented in Tibet, and resume dialogue with representatives of His Holiness the Dalai Lama to resolve the problem of Tibet,” the CTA said in a release.
According to Xinhua, China’s official news agency, the delegation met with Congressman Charles Boustany, co-chair of the bipartisan U.S.-China Working Group in the House of Representatives, congressional researchers and staff as well as experts of the Brookings Institute, during its two-day stay in Washington DC.
Choling claimed that Tibetans enjoy an “uncompromisingly safeguarded” freedom to all religious beliefs and called the self-immolators irresponsible “to themselves, their families and society as a whole.”
“We stand firm against any act aimed at undermining Tibetan stability and national unity, especially when these acts are designed to obtain political purposes at the expense of human lives,” the report quoted him as saying.
Since 2009, as many as 119 Tibetans living under China’s rule have set themselves on fire demanding freedom and the return of exiled Tibetan spiritual leader His Holiness the Dalai Lama. The Chinese government has responded with even harsher policies, criminalising the self-immolation protests and sentencing scores of people to heavy prison terms on charges of “intentional homicide” for their alleged roles in self-immolation protests. Chinese officials have barred Tibetans from offering prayers and showing solidarity with families of self-immolators and announced the cancellation of development funds to those villages where self-immolations have taken place.
“Despite repeated appeals by the international community, China has been steadfast in its refusal to open up Tibet to independent fact-finding delegations and the international media to investigate the true causes behind the self-immolations,” Kalon Dicki Chhoyang of the Department of Information & International Relations of the Central Tibetan Administration said.
“Sending a group of individuals to disseminate Chinese State propaganda will prove a futile exercise in foreign countries where freedom of speech and respect for human rights are fundamental values.”
