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For Beijing, Tibet threat is 'life and death'
Officials say exiled leaders seek independence to break up China.
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Zhang's tirade appeared designed to strip the Tibetan leader of moral authority in the eyes of his people. Among his goals, Zhang claimed, was "to overthrow the leadership of the Communist Party of China … and restore the cruel slavery system of imperialism."
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The Chinese authorities have chosen to heap all the blame for the recent troubles on the Dalai Lama's head, say some local and foreign analysts, because they have no other choice.
"This has a lot to do with China's long-term Tibetan policy, which they don't mention," says Mr. Liu. After more than 50 years of Chinese rule and economic aid, Tibetans are still restless enough to protest as they did last week.
The Tibetans have been eager to present themselves internationally as victims of last week's violence in Lhasa; exile groups have put the death toll at 99. But in challenging this version of events, the Chinese government has been reluctant to make too much use of video footage showing Tibetan youths beating Han Chinese to death and burning their shops, which would suggest that Chinese migrants were victims.
"That would be very sensitive," says Liu. "It would spread ethnic hatred." Beijing is anxious to present an image of ethnic harmony in Lhasa, despite widespread reports of Tibetan resentment at the rising tide of migrants from other parts of China.
Blaming the 'Dalai clique'
Indeed, the mainstream view in Beijing is that the Dalai Lama is responsible for provoking ethnic conflict. "Relations between the Han and [Muslim] Hui and Tibetans are very good," says Zhang Yun, a professor at the state-sponsored China Institute for Tibetan Studies.
"Maybe recently, some business disputes have broken out, but they are isolated incidents that the Dalai Lama seizes on ... to stir up hatred," he charges.
Nor do many Chinese Tibet experts accept claims by exile Tibetans, widely believed in the West, that last week's marches and riots illustrate broad dissatisfaction among Tibetans with Chinese rule. Among the rioters, says Professor Zhang, "were just a few local people who insist on Tibetan independence." The rest, he argues, were Dalai Lama loyalists who had returned from exile after studying abroad, and "others who don't want to work and got paid for being violent with the things they stole from stores."
"The Dalai clique maintained real-time contacts ... through varied channels with the rioters in Lhasa, and dictated instructions to his hard-core devotees and synchronized their moves," the official Xinhua news agency claimed in a commentary Tuesday.
Though officials from Prime Minister Wen downward have made much of the threat they see to China's territorial integrity from the Dalai Lama's activities, few scholars here share their fears.
"Tibet has been under Chinese control for seven centuries," says Zhang, presenting the Chinese account of Tibetan history. "Sometimes it was relatively tight, and sometimes relatively loose, but even when China was very poor and weak" in the early 20th century, "Tibet was never independent.
"Now our national power is very strong," Zhang adds. "So from both historical and practical perspectives, Tibetan independence is an impossibility."
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