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World condemns Tibet crackdown
15/03/2008 22:32 - (SA)
Paris - Taiwan led sweeping condemnation on Saturday of China's brutal crackdown on protestors in Tibet and accused Beijing of trying to gloss over its rights record with Olympic sheen.
About 30 people have been killed during unrest in Lhasa, according to the Tibetan government-in-exile in India, although China's state-run Xinhua news agency earlier put the figure at 10, citing government officials.
The arm-flexing has caused newspapers around the world to start talking about a possible boycott of the upcoming Olympic Games in Beijing.
"This incident fully reflects the Chinese government's characteristics: dictatorship and bullying. Such a government won't tolerate the Tibetan people in their pursuit of speech of freedom," pro-independence President Chen Shui-bian told a crowd in southern Chiayi city.
Taiwan's foreign ministry added in a statement that "China attempts to promote the illusion of its 'peaceful rise' by hosting the 2008 Beijing Olympics but in fact it targets Taiwan with missiles and suppresses Tibetan people's pursuit for freedom and democracy."
India 'distressed'
The Tibetan issue is already a source of tension between New Delhi and Beijing, with India playing host to Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama as well as his government-in-exile.
"We are distressed by reports of the unsettled situation and violence in Lhasa, and by the deaths of innocent people," India's foreign ministry said in a statement.
"We would hope that all those involved will work to improve the situation and remove the causes of such trouble in Tibet, which is an autonomous region of China, through dialogue and non-violent means," it added.
US Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama called on Beijing to account for the status of Buddhist monks detained.
Olympics
He said this year's Olympics in Beijing were an opportunity for China to demonstrate its progress on human rights.
"But the events in Tibet these last few days unfortunately show a different face of China," said Obama.
Japan, which has been trying to repair relations with China, has taken a relatively low profile on Tibet, but a foreign ministry statement urged Beijing to show restraint.
Germany meanwhile backed the Tibetans' rights to religious and cultural autonomy, while "supporting the policy of a single China".
"A lasting solution to the Tibet question can perhaps only be found through a peaceful and direct dialogue," Chancellor Angela Merkel's spokesman Ulrich Wilhelm said in a statement.
Meanwhile, nearly 2 000 people rallied in Zurich with Swiss nationals joining Tibetan protesters outside the Chinese consulate, the news agency ATS reported.
Some demonstrators pelted the building with stones before police intervened with tear gas to disperse the crowd.
- AFP
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