Image:courtesy of @tibettruth
Category Archives: Tibet
Al Jazeera & Its Media Buddies Spreading China’s Propaganda
Graphic courtesy of @anonymoustibet
With reports Sunday May 27 of two more self-immolations in occupied Tibet, reported to have happened in the Tibetan capital of Lhasa, once again the mainstream media has been serving as a willing servant of China’s propaganda. The reportage has been saturated with China’s distortions on Tibet and describing what are Tibetan locations, regions and territory as Chinese.See Here For Example Please help our efforts to expose and challenge such gross disinformation and if you see such reports kindly think before sharing on Twitter or Facebook, as that action spreads the lies and misleads others.
May 23rd 1951: Seventeen Reasons Why Only Tibet’s Independence Will Do
Graphic:courtesy of @tibettruth
The Ecologist: Endorsing China’s Imperialist Arguments?
China’s Colonists Destroying Tibet’s Grasslands Through Fencing/Over-Grazing
Image:archivenet
We received recently a copy of an article ‘The Global Cost Of China’s Destruction Of The ‘Roof Of The World’ from the respected English journal, The Ecologist on the subject of environmental issues arising from China’s presence in occupied Tibet, a catalog of ecological degradation, fueled by an un-sleeping exploitation of Tibet’s natural resources, principly mineral extraction (including Uranium), state approved logging on a massive scale in Eastern Tibet that has transformed once verdant mountain forest into a lunar like landscape, and ill-considered hydro-schemes which are seriously reducing lake and river levels, along with access to clean water for Tibetans. The environmental impact of China’s occupation of Tibet is severe indeed, ask Tibetan nomads who have seen their formerly free and open grasslands, eroded and denuded of minerals following China forcible annexation of such regions, imposing insane agricultural policies that have poisoned the land, generating desertification along with over-grazing caused by China imposing fences across the region.
Barbed-Wire Fencing Denying Tibetan Nomads Their Lands
Image: archivenet
Any investigation and critique of China’s ecological record in Tibet is very welcome and adds much-needed exposure to a subject that, for whatever reason appears to draw relatively little concern from the wider environmental movement. Within that important context we applaud The Ecologist for running the article, however those who are aware, and knowledgeable regarding the nature of China’s occupation of Tibet, will in all likely hood share our sense of disappointment at some of the assertions featured in the article, with respect to what is described as ‘The Benefits Of Chinese Occupation’. The following extracts illustrate the concerns we have, to which are added our critical response.
“Chinese government has tried to win over the people by improving the material wealth of the country. They have increased the average national income, developed industry and in certain areas improved living conditions. Many Chinese believe that they liberated the Tibetan peasants from exploitation by a medieval feudal state and a religious establishment…….No one disputes the fact that Beijing has poured both money and resources into the Tibetan Autonomous Region.” Source:The global cost of China’s destruction of the ‘roof of the world’, Sylvia Downes, The Ecologist May 11, 2012
Whatever the claims of China’s propaganda, which has distorted the understanding of its people on Tibet since 1950, resulting in the warped perception that China was a force for liberation and improvement, the reality is that we are in truth looking at military annexation, followed by colonization, exploitation with the aim of assimilating and eradicating Tibetan national identity. It is curious why The Ecologist seems so willing to consume as fact claims, which owe their origin to China’s Ministry Of Disinformation, that the supposed investment into Tibet, has had as a target the improvement of Tibetan lives. While considerable funds have been directed to develop and maintain transport infrastructure, tourism development and industrial projects, these are to consolidate China’s control over Tibet. Such funding sustains and encourages Chinese colonization of Tibet, which is on a scale that seriously threatens the stability of a future Tibetan population, aided by the forcible sterilization of Tibetan women. In accepting Chinese disinformation that it’s occupation of Tibet is seeing a material improvement for Tibetans the article is endorsing what is in essence an argument used by all imperialist aggressors, that justifies the suppression and virulent exploitation of a people by insisting its presence is improving the lot of the ‘natives’!
Tibet’s Nomads Forced Into Concentration Settlements While China Destroys The Environment
Image:archivenet
However, the only people who are truly gaining advantage in occupied Tibet are China’s colonists and its regime, leaving Tibetans a grossly deprived and viciously oppressed people in their own land, the misery of which can never be compensated for by the questionable benefits of China’s crass consumerism. What operates in occupied Tibet is economic, educational and health provision apartheid in which Tibetans are a subject people, living under the tyranny of a violent and illegal occupation. Is that the material improvement The Ecologist is so happy to assert as a fact? We wonder if the Editors of that journal would have been so ready to repeat the propaganda claims of South Africa’s former racist regime, that the lives of black people in Soweto, were improved by the commercial successes emerging under a system of Apartheid?
Spanish Mining Company Screws Tibet For China’s Blood Money
Image:ferroatlantica/graphic courtesy of @AnonymousTibet
Maybe we are a touch under-informed, idealistic but is there not legislation operating within the European Union which restricts or prevents European corporations from activities and or partnerships which raise issues of ethics and/or can impose suffering or environmental damage to people’s beyond the EU? Furthermore, does that fragile institution not have policies, and a moral integrity, which impose a number of regulatory requirements upon European companies that seek to collaborate with China’s regime. Particularly in which an oppressed people, such as Tibetans are marginalized and whose lands and culture are negatively impacted as a consequence of such a venture?
That being so would someone at the European Union or Parliament care to explain the presence of Ferro-Atlantica, a Spanish Corporation operating near the Tibetan town of Dartsedo, in Tibet’s Eastern Region of Kham. See Here Has this company been subject to any environmental, ethical regulations, or assessed in terms of the ecological effects of its operation upon Tibetans and their environment? Have procedures been diligently followed? If so by whom and when?
We consider these to be important questions for the EU to address, which is always ready to issue platitudes in praise of the Dalai Lama, yet seems less outspoken on China’s environmental record in its colonialist exploitation of occupied Tibet. Surely i has something to say on the role of a Spanish corporation operating inside Tibet and the serious environmental consequences of locating a Silicon processing plant in such a pristine environment,apart from troubling questions on the ethics of collaboration with a regime that is viciously suppressing local Tibetans.
Online Action
If you are based with the European Union you can be a real force for good by raising this issue with your MEP. Ask them to submit questions on Ferro- Atlantica and its presence in occupied Tibet, along with the environmental and ethical concerns mentioned above. Request your MEP to obtain documentation as to what regulatory, environmental or ethical policies were exercised by the EU in endorsing this venture, to identify if an independent, EU approved, ecological risk assessment was carried out, and what system of monitoring it has put in place to properly evaluate any environmental impacts.
The MEP of your region may be identified here, along with email contact details
China Using Eco-Tourism As Part Of Its Propaganda Warfare
Graphic courtesy of @AnonymousTibet
Aiding Tibetans-Aiding China’s Regime?
Image:tibethealthproject
A recent exchange with one of our @tibettruth Twitter colleagues and fellow supporter of Tibet has raised an issue which we feel it important to outline our position on. It relates to the subject of Non Governmental Organizations (NGOs) that run projects inside occupied Tibet, some of which extend limited medical or other support to remote Tibetan communities. We can entirely understand how anyone seeing images of such work would consider those actions as a valuable humanitarian service. We also respect the motivation of individuals who provide relief to Tibetans, yet in addition to acknowledging such positive support we have questions, based upon ethics and the political reality of China’s tyrannical occupation of Tibet. Our concerns are founded upon the following points:
1). It is well known that the virtual majority of Tibetans live under a genocidal occupation, violently denied political, cultural or religious freedoms, against this background what projects that do operate benefit a relative handful of Tibetans, who receive limited ‘support’. We consider genuine development should be for the advantage of all Tibetans, funded, organized and enjoyed by Tibetans themselves, in which Tibet’s people have the political and economic independence to determine the nature and administration of aid projects. Unfortunately the reality is that under China’s totalitarian occupation of Tibet that’s not likely to happen, while it is for political and propaganda purposes tolerant of isolated foreign NGO projects over which China exerts a stranglehold.
2) Apart from such considerations there are questions relating to how China manipulates and controls such NGO’s for the purposes of dis-information. This can be seen via the propaganda illusion such projects present upon their websites, it is sadly all too common to see organizations filling their commentary, with terminology that meets the dictatorial approval of China’s regime. So it is that we find NGOs describing what are in truth Tibetan regions, as Chinese provinces, or avoiding any political reference by using the term ‘plateau’, a loaded term much favored by China’s propagandists. These distortions are subsequently consumed across the Internet by many who have no knowledge of Tibet or its condition and so China’s cynical deceit is promulgated and many seriously misinformed.
3) There is also the subject of omission by such NGOs, who through having to collaborate with China’s regime, find themselves imprisoned by a self-inflicted censorship, they dare not touch upon any issues of sensitivity to China, which include human rights and the thorny issue of Tibetan independence and resistance to China’s rule. The result is somewhat sanitized accounts, that carefully avoid any reference to the odious realities of life for Tibetans under China’s tyranny, supported by images of Tibetans that perpetrate the illusion of a contented people whose culture appears to be thriving. What the overwhelming majority of people do not realize is that such photos are taken under tightly controlled and monitored circumstances, designed to conform to the approval of Chinese authorities. These photographs are made available to people on the Internet, who for the most part have no knowledge of the appalling situation inside Tibet, now confronted with a sterilized and flawed report on Tibet, accompanied by pictures of smiling Tibetans in colorful traditional costume. An image that serves entirely the objectives of China’s Ministry of Propaganda.
4) Lastly from an ethical perspective alone we are deeply concerned at any organization that is prepared to abandon principles which oppose injustice, tyranny and oppression, on the questionable reasoning that it can offer geographically (and resource-wise) limited support to a few individuals. That such groups can collaborate with a regime that is so violently terrorizing a people, while cynically exploiting such organizations, is also troubling and raises a number of difficult questions in terms of moral integrity. Would for example such bodies have cooperated with Pol Pot’s regime, ignoring his genocide against Buddhist Cambodians on the justification that their presence was aiding a few hundred, while beyond the village, the rest of the population were tortured, killed and subjected to a range of atrocities? Similar concerns apply in the case of occupied Tibet and while we can applaud the individual motives and selfless dedication of those feeling compassion for Tibetans it is our position to ask what are difficult questions concerning such collaborations.
National Geographic Must Change It’s Map Policy On Tibet
Extract Of National Geographic Tibet Map From 1960s
The effort continues to question National Geographic’s (NG) policy on presenting Tibet as part of China, including the use of Sinocized place-names, that have replaced Romanised Tibetan versions.Thanks to the tireless activism and support of many friends on Facebook and Twitter considerable pressure is being generated that demands the respected journal to review its troubling willingness to present as cartographic fact, what in reality is China’s bogus propaganda claims that Tibet is part of Chinese territory. Today we received from our colleagues Bod Rangzen a response from National Geographic, to an individual who felt so concerned that Tibet is being wiped off the map that they contacted their offices, here is the reply from NG.
“Dear…:
Your May 10 email regarding National Geographic’s cartographic portrayal of Tibet has been brought to my attention. The purpose of every National Geographic reference map or atlas is to provide our readers with sufficient information by which the current geopolitical reality of the world’s disputed regions can be presented. This policy extends to place-names, where we adhere to official rather than academic or other toponymic conventions. Please note, that where scale permits, our maps do label Tibet and show the boundaries and administrative center—Lhasa—of this Chinese autonomous region.
Although China’s occupation of Tibet might be unrecognized or considered illegal by some, the fact remains that this region is presently administered by China. To otherwise portray Tibet, either cartographically or toponymically, would be misleading to our readers and contradict the Society’s long held policy of portraying de facto situations. Thank you for expressing your views on this issue. Your interest in National Geographic is appreciated.
Juan José Valdés
The Geographer
Director of Editorial and Research
National Geographic Maps”
Firstly what Mr Valdés chooses to ignore is the fact that Tibet itself is not comprised of China’s propaganda creation (the so-called ‘Tibet Autonomous Region’) but is far larger made up of three traditional regions namely U-Tsang, Kham and Amdo. Secondly we should remind him that Tibet and its people are not ‘administered’ by China but are in fact occupied, exploited and colonized by a violent and oppressive regime. To assert that Tibet is under the administrative control of China’s regime is a grossly misleading and fact-free statement, rather like claiming that during the early 1940s France was ‘administered’ by Hitler’s Germany. Rightfully at that time cartographers did not make such claims, yet the National Geographic is content to misrepresent Tibet while endorsing China’s illegal occupation of that blighted land.
Furthermore, in his evasive and flawed reply Juan José Valdés avoids a truth when he claims that ‘some’ regard China’s occupation of Tibet as illegal, what his organization fails to recognize or declare is that within international law Tibet is an independent nation under illegal occupation.This was examined and agreed at an international conference of leading lawyers in 1993
ONLINE ACTION
It is surely time to put Tibet back on the world map, minus China’s poisonous distortions, if you agree please help us by emailing National Geographic and asking them to restore Tibet and authentic Tibetan place names on its maps and atlases. They may be contacted here: maps@ngs.org
