tibetan arts and culture

PRESS RELEASE

I would like to take this opportunity to express my deep gratitude to world leaders and the international community for their concern over the recent sad turn of events in Tibet and for their attempts to persuade the Chinese authorities to exercise restraint in dealing with the demonstrations.

Since the Chinese Government has accused me of orchestrating these protests in Tibet, I call for a thorough investigation by a respected body, which should include Chinese representatives, to look into these allegations. Such a body would need to visit Tibet, the traditional Tibetan areas outside the Tibet Autonomous Region, and also the Central Tibetan Administration here in India. In order for the international community, and especially the more than one billion Chinese people who do not have access to uncensored information, to find out what is really going on in Tibet, it would be of tremendously helpful if representatives of the international media also undertook such investigations.

Whether it was intended or not, I believe that a form of cultural genocide has taken place in Tibet, where the Tibetan identity has been under constant attack. Tibetans have been reduced to an insignificant minority in their own land as a result of the huge transfer of non-Tibetans into Tibet. The distinctive Tibetan cultural heritage with its characteristic language, customs and traditions is fading away. Instead of working to unify its nationalities, the Chinese government discriminates against these minority nationalities, the Tibetans among them.

It is common knowledge that Tibetan monasteries, which constitute our principal seats of learning, besides being the repository of Tibetan Buddhist culture, have been severely reduced in both in number and population. In those monasteries that do still exist, serious study of Tibetan Buddhism is no longer allowed; in fact, even admission to these centres of learning is being strictly regulated. In reality, there is no religious freedom in Tibet. Even to call for a little more freedom is to risk being labeled a separatist. Nor is there any real autonomy in Tibet, even though these basic freedoms are guaranteed by the Chinese constitution.

I believe the demonstrations and protests taking place in Tibet are a spontaneous outburst of public resentment built up by years of repression in defiance of authorities that are oblivious to the sentiments of the local populace. They mistakenly believe that further repressive measures are the way to achieve their declared aim of long-term unity and stability.

On our part, we remain committed to taking the Middle Way approach and pursuing a process of dialogue in order to find a mutually beneficial solution to the Tibetan issue.

With these points in mind, I also seek the international community’s support for our efforts to resolve Tibet’s problems through dialogue, and I urge them to call upon the Chinese leadership to exercise the utmost restraint in dealing with the current disturbed situation and to treat those who are being arrested properly and fairly.

Dalai Lama
Dharamsala
March 18, 2008

http://www.dalailama.com (image credit)

HH Sakya Trizin offers HH Dalai Lama Long Life Arrow

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NO, TIBET IS NOT FREE...Please Try to Take Some Time to Speak to People You Meet Each Day about the Ongoing Situation in Tibet. Familiarise Yourself with Daily Events There, and Updates, so You Can Help Create Awareness in the World Community. NEVER GIVE UP!

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Join the Global Uprising for Tibet! Help us draw attention to the worsening human rights situation inside Tibet.

Systematic human rights abuses in China
Oppressive 57-year occupation of Tibet
Repression of religious and other freedoms
Brutal persecution of the Falun Gong
Cynical indifference to the genocide in Darfur
Support for the cruel ruling junta in Burma

While most of the world continues to turn a blind eye, we urge you to speak out against this shameful behavior.

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Fifteen years ago the Dalai Lama formally called for the establishment of the entire Tibetan plateau as a “Zone of Peace”, a place where world peace would be promoted and environmental protection strictly enforced with sustainable development practices. This “Tibetan cultural area,” as it’s sometimes called, includes Tibet, Ladakh and the Himalayan rim of Nepal, Sikkim and Bhutan, but the environmental devastation impacts upon the global communities.

Tibet holds a unique position with its territory covering the highest plateau on the earth; but more unique is that Tibet, alone among all nations, chose to abandon the path of aggression and military technology to pursue instead the creation of a society devoted to spiritual development and peace.

For more than five decades, precious resources have been extracted. Sacred lands are now mining grounds. Against all canons of international law, Tibet has been forcibly occupied by Chinese communist forces since 1949. The new, impoverished Tibet lies in ruins as if a mad elephant had run amok there. Deforested, desertified, with its wildlife decimated, Tibet enters a plea to the international community to study the urgent situation.

This ultimate irony is extremely disturbing for Tibetans whose motherland, once dedicated to peaceful development of the human mind, has become the storehouse for Chinese nuclear weapons and a place for dumping radioactive waste. This is especially critical for the countries “downstream” but, in fact, we are all “downstream” from Tibet.

Once naturally protected by its isolation, and pervasive ethos of living in harmony with nature, Tibet’s mountains constitute the headwaters of many of Asia’s major rivers. This great river system’s trans-national flow supplies fresh water to the most populous regions of the world. Water for millions. Water with toxic metals, flowing uninterruptedly through the Three Gorges Dam, amidst international protest. Through the world’s largest hydroelectric plants, it quenches parched throats in the people of the lowlands. Major life arteries, waterways from Tibet's’ YarlungTsangpo down into India’s Brahmaputra, are slated for rerouting amidst international outcry.

From Gormo to Lhasa, the first railway in Tibet carries Tibet’s resources to fuel factories in distant Chinese cities, cities who have consolidated military control over the Tibetan region for more than five decades, cities to whose refineries 15 million tonnes of Tibet’s oil and petroleum products move by rail to the first Tibet-based, petrochemical industrial base in arid Gormo. And yet another 40 kms of railway track was laid to connect China’s nuclear weapons research and development facility in the Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture. It is a means to continue the transfer of Chinese population into Tibet, reducing Tibetans into an insignificant minority in their own land.

“To know the road ahead, ask those coming back”. This ancient Chinese proverb might be reflected upon to avoid debacles of large scale economic development, especially in such fragile environments. The looming threat of destruction and death must interface with an alternate ethical approach to bring recovery, help and sustainability.

At the Roof of the World we see an example of people who have endured, and are enduring, great suffering and adversity. Their hope is to have their land returned and transform the whole of it into a Zone of Peace and non violence; secure fundamental human rights and restore and protect its natural environment; and commence earnest negotiations now on the future status of Tibet.

Time passes unhindered, and when mistakes are made we cannot turn back the clock and try again. All we can do is use the present well and make the rest of our lives as meaningful as possible. We can no longer think only of ourselves, only this life, but also extend our hearts toward the welfare of all beings. Let’s try not to hurt but to help each other.