Radio France International is certainly not the mouthpiece of the PRC government. Their April 2, 2008 news included an interview (in Chinese) of an official in the Tibet Exile Government. At first when I heard this I thought it was a cruel April Fools Day joke. But was it?
Before I post the story below, I want to make a different comment. In the process of researching this, I found that Yahoo China had published photos of 19 "most wanted" Tibetans. Although Yahoo had denied that they did this, reports from Chinese websites such as this confirm that they had seen these photos on Yahoo China news site. I think that it is disgraceful for an American company to become a tool used in a Chinese crackdown.
Now back to the problem of Tibetan violence. My view is that the west has been too naive on this and has even encouraged ethnic violence in Lhasa by not condemning it. I know this view is unpopular and I had been TR'ed before for this, and accused of being a Chinese propagandist. As a lifelong Democrat (as soon as I landed on US soil more than 25 years ago), I find such accusations very ill-informed and sad. I am not going to engage in fruitless argument on who is right. I could quite possibly wrong. But I would like an informed discussion in which I get an education on why I am wrong.
The audio (click the link above the earphone icon) is 9'1'' long and is in Chinese. I didn't transcribe this myself. I'm using a transcription that is widely circulated on all Chinese bbs websites all over the world (for example, this site in Germany). If you don't trust my translation please find someone you trust and check it.
The introduction on the webpage that titled "Tibet Exile Government Answers Beijing Charges" says:
中国官方多次质疑达赖喇嘛
340;非暴力政策,并且多次质问
,如果达赖喇嘛真的主张非
292;力,那他为什么没有对拉萨
藏人屠杀汉人的行为作出谴$
131;,就以上一系列问题,我们
采访了西藏流亡政府中国事
153;负责人达瓦才仁先生:
English translation:
Chinese government repeatedly questioned the nonviolence policy of the Dalai Lama, and asked, if the Dalai Lama really advocates nonviolence, then why he did not condemn the massacre of ethnic Han in Lhasa by Tibetans. To answer these questions, we interviewed the official in charge of Chinese affairs in the Tibet Exile Government, Mr. Dawacairen:
The real shocker comes at 6'10'' of the audio, when Mr. Dawacairen said the following:
首先必须要声明的是,藏人
174;头到尾使用的是非暴力,从
藏人的角度来讲,暴力指
的是对生命的伤害。(从头
040;尾藏人)从镜头里可以看打
汉人,但都是打而已,打完
197;
后那些汉人都会跑掉,仅仅
159;殴打,而不是伤害生命。那
么那么那些被杀的人全部都
159;
出于意外,从中共的报道里&
754;都可以非常清楚的看到,他
们(汉人)都是在藏人砸门
340;
时候,跑到楼上躲起来,躲$
215;来藏人放火烧的时候,他们
都没有逃跑,而是藏起来,
467;
果后来就意外的烧死了,而%
027;些点火、放火的人他们根本
不知道楼上有汉人躲藏。所
197;
被烧死的人不仅有汉人,也
377;藏人,所以这些事情都是一
种意外,不是屠杀。
English translation:
First I must declear, that Tibetans were following nonviolence from the beginning to the end. For Tibetans, violence is to harm a life. In the video we can see some beating of Han people. But these were merely beating. Afterwards the Han people would run away. It's only beating, not harming lives. So those who were killed were all accidents. You can see from Chinese communist reporting, that they were, when the Tibetans broke open the doors, they went to hide in the attics. So when the fire was set, they didn't run away but instead hid in the house. As a result they were accidentally burnt to death. People who set the fire never knew that there were people hiding in the attic. So there were both Han and Tibetan people who were burnt to death. These were all accidents, not massacre.
If someone can provide evidence that this was a fabrication, I'd gladly delete this diary and apologize. I will also do my best to spread the word to Chinese that this is a fabrication. OTOH, what if this is real? 100 million Chinese have read this. We've got a big problem.
As regard that nonviolent Tibet Exile Government, it is well documented that this exile government was on CIA's payroll from the beginning, and tried armed insurgency in China. You have to come up with a better argument to convince me that they had been nonviolent from the beginning.