The Chinese authorities have rejected foreign aid and refused the request of the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of the Tibetans, to return to his hometown to comfort survivors.
The deadly earthquake last week in Yushu Tibetan Prefecture of Qinghai Province in northwestern China has affected 100,000 people, leaving at least 2,064 dead and 12,000 injured.
Professor Yuan Hongbin, a well-known liberal jurist and writer in exile, analyzed the situation from different perspectives in an interview with The Epoch Times.
Economic exploitation
Professor Yuan said that the quake caused such serious casualties among the Tibetans because they still live in houses made of mud brick. They live in these houses even after the regime has ruled Tibet for over 60 years.
Yuan believes the regime is exploiting Tibet’s natural resources. “During the past 60 years, the regime has taken an immeasurable amount of coal from the Qinghai area,“ he said. ”The Tibetans don’t know where the coal has been used. But from the information we’ve collected, the money made from coal has been spent on purchasing weapons for the military.”
All the while, the Tibetans are living in primitive mud-brick houses. “This is solid proof of the regime’s economic exploitation of the Tibetan areas,” he said.
Fear of exposure
Rescue teams lacked rescue equipment and relief supplies. Moreover, the rescue workers and their dogs suffered from altitude sickness which compromised their rescue efforts. The earthquake victims had to sleep on the streets without electricity, food, water, or tents. However, the authorities refused foreign aid groups and domestic volunteers from entering the area. Desperately needed help was turned away, and many opportunities to save more people were lost.
Yuan said the reason the regime is so fearful of allowing outside rescue workers to enter the disaster area is that they are afraid of allowing the outside world to have direct contact with the Tibetans. “They are afraid that the outside world will find out the Tibetan’s loyalty to their religious beliefs, their admiration of the Dalai Lama, and their anger toward the colonial rule of the Communist regime for the past 60 years,” Yuan said.
On April 17, the Dalai Lama’s request to visit the quake-stricken area was denied. His request to enter after the 2008 Sichuan earthquake that killed approximately 70,000 people was also rejected.
Yuan commented: “The regime would like to continue implementing their policy of cultural genocide in Tibet. It is afraid that the Tibetans would start fighting harder for their freedom and fate after the Dalai Lama returned home.”
“Ever since the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) took power, it has been making every effort to destroy the traditional ethnic Han culture as well as other ethnic cultures.” He said its purpose is to turn China into a spiritual and cultural colony of Marxism-Leninism through the strategy of cultural genocide.
In order to preserve the Tibetan culture, the Dalai Lama went into exile with 100,000 followers 50 years ago. Since then they have successfully rebuilt their culture and made the Tibetan Buddhist culture popular in the world for the first time. “The regime dreads and hates the Tibetan culture, especially the strong religious belief they have demonstrated over the past 60 years under the CCP’s rule,” Yuan said.
Read the original Chinese article
