A not too Peaceful Liberation of Tibet

This interview with Zhu Weiqun, the Executive Vice Minister of the United Front Work Department of the Communist Central Committee shows once again the guilty consciousness of the Chinese leadership.
Sixty years after the so-called 'Liberation', no-one is fooled, Beijing has not 'liberated' Tibet, Beijing has invaded Tibet. 
Zhu admits this fact when he says: "At the end of 1949, Chairman Mao indicated that 'the earlier we enter Tibet, the better'".  
If China needs to 'enter' Tibet, it means that China is 'outside' Tibet, isn't it? 
Then Zhu confirms: "In October 1950, the People's Liberation Army launched the 'Chamdo Battle', crushing down the scheme of the small number of upper-class reactionaries in Tibet who tried to resist the liberation of Tibet by taking advantage of the geographically fortified Jinshajiang [Yangtse] River Front and  the support of foreign forces". 
Though, Zhu and his colleagues perfectly know well that no foreigner was involved in Chamdo, they recurrently use this old argument. 
Further the fact they had to 'crush' the Tibetan Army shows that the PLA did not really 'liberate' Tibet.
Then Zhu continues: "After nearly one month's negotiation, the local government of Tibet signed 'the 17-Article Agreement' with the Chinese central government.  Thus Tibet was peacefully liberated." 
The 17-Point Agreement was signed under duress and the seals of the Tibetan government were forged. These are historical facts.
When Zhu states: "In fact, the Dalai Lama knew well the goodwill of the Central Government, but he insisted going further in a wrong way," referring to his flight to India, what choice had the Tibetan leader but to leave Tibet after having tried hard to 'cohabitate' with the Chinese occupiers. 
Incidentally, it is the 'masses' who revolted when the entire population of Lhasa surrounded his Norbulingka Palace in March 1959. They wanted to stop the Dalai Lama from attending a suspicious invitation ('unarmed' and without escort) in the Chinese military camp.
Zhu Weiqun asserts: "In 1995, after careful studies on the Dalai Lama's sabotage activities in the past decades, the Central Government affirms four allegations over the Dalai Lama: the leader of the separatist clique that conspires the independence of Tibet, a ready puppet of the international anti-China forces, the root of social disorder in Tibet, and the biggest obstacle against regular religious order of Tibet Buddhism".
These allegations are so childish that nobody can really believe them, though as I mentioned yesterday, if nobody believes the Chinese Government for internal matters, the people in China still have a tendency to have faith in their Government when it concerns external issues.
The interesting point is that Zhu Weiqun who is the official interlocutor of the Dalai Lama's Envoys for the Beijing-Dharamsala talks seems very short of decent arguments to prove Beijing bona-fide in invading (not liberating) Tibet and refusing to negotiate any 'middle path' solution with the Dalai Lama.
The Chinese have a basic problem: they invaded Tibet and they are ready to admit it. Who can believe, 60 years later, that they 'liberated' the Land of Snows? 
I still don't understand why the Tibetans in exile have chosen the 60th anniversary of the signature of the 17-Point Agreement for holding an important National General Meeting (see my previous posting on the subject). 
Perhaps to show the Chinese how vibrant their democracy is?

Peaceful Liberation of Tibet: Splendid Chapter in Chinese Annals of National Unity
China Tibet Online

2011-05-07
Editor's Note: At the request of "China's Tibet" magazine, Zhu Weiqun, Executive Vice Minister of the United Front Work Department of the CPC Central Committee, has accepted this exclusive interview with the magazine, just a couple of weeks before the 60th anniversary of the signing of the "Agreement on Measure for the Peaceful Liberation of Tibet"(the 17-Article Agreement) and the peaceful liberation of Tibet. The full text of this interview will be published on the May 15 edition of "China's Tibet". 

Peaceful liberation: Tibet never to separate from its motherland

Reporter: May 23 this year marks the 60th anniversary of the signing of the "Agreement of the Central People's Government and the Local Government of Tibet on Measures for the peaceful Liberation of Tibet". How do you evaluate this historical event?

Mr. Zhu Weiqun: The peaceful liberation of Tibet is a milestone in the national liberation undertaking of the Chinese people under the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party (CPC), as well as in the entire Chinese nation's century-long struggle for national unity.
Not long after the "three decisive victories" during the Chinese civil war, Chairman Mao proposed to settle the Tibet-related issues. In early 1949, he said "it is not difficult to settle the Tibet-related issues, yet we have to avoid being too hasty or imprudent" when meeting with USSR President Stalin's special envoy Mikoyan. At the end of 1949, Chairman Mao indicated that "the earlier we enter Tibet, the better" during his visit to USSR.
In October 1950, the People's Liberation Army launched the "Chamdo Battle", crushing down the scheme of the small number of upper-class reactionaries in Tibet who tried to resist the liberation of Tibet by taking advantage of the geographically fortified Jinshajiang River Front and  the support of foreign forces.
The victory of the PLA in Chamdo persuaded the Tibet local government headed by the 14th Dalai Lama to send a delegation to Beijing for peace talks. After nearly one month's negotiation, the local government of Tibet signed "the 17-Article Agreement" with the Chinese central government.  Thus Tibet was peacefully liberated.
This indicates the settlement of Tibet issue had been put on the top priority of the blueprint of the establishment of the People's Republic of China by the CPC leadership. Whether liberated in a peaceful way or in non-peaceful ways, Tibet must be liberated; otherwise the CPC would fail to accomplish its historical mission.
History has proved the correctness of the decision made by the CPC central committee and Chairman Mao, as we may have encountered more challenges if the PLA had not entered Tibet by then.
In my opinion, the Peaceful Liberation of Tibet not only marked the crash of the attempt of the imperialism and a minority of Tibetan reactionary upper class to separate Tibet from the whole country, but also realized the complete liberation and reunification of the whole China. As you know, Tibet is a part of China since the ancient time. From the Yuan Dynasty, the Central Government exercised direct and effective authority over Tibet.  In the modern history, western imperialists started to covet Tibet of China. The Britain launched two military attacks over Tibet in 1888 and 1904 respectively, and occupied Tibet in 1904. However, they discovered that military power could not only separate Tibet from China, in which Tibet locals and masses were all in obedience to the authority of the Central Government. Therefore, the British imperialism started to foster pro-Britain forces from the upper class of Tibet, by whom to plot "Tibet independence". There was no term of "independence" in Tibetan language before the, so it was absolutely made up by Western colonialists. On the eve of the great victory of people's liberation war, American and British imperialists and a batch of Tibetan reactionaries in Tibet's upper class feared that they may lose the last chance, then they plotted numbers of separatism incidents such as "banishing the Han people", and attempted to bring up the issue of "Tibet independence" to the Communist Party of China. However, the success of the "Chamdo Battle", the signing of the "17 Article Agreement" and the PLA's peaceful entry into Tibet all smashed western imperialism's illusions. The peaceful liberation of Tibet is the achievement made at the cost of many Chinese people's lives for their century-long pursuit of national reunification and ethnic dignity, which made the attempt of separating Tibet from China impossible forever.
Another significance of the peaceful liberation of Tibet lies in another fact that it provided preconditions for the democratic reform in Tibet from feudal serfdom into modern socialist system.
According to the actual situation in Tibet, the "17-Article Agreement" stipulates: "the Central Government will not change the existing political system of Tibet, nor will it change the Dalai Lama's inherent status and position", "In matters relating to reforms in Tibet, there would be no coercion on the part of the central authorities, and the reform would be carried out by the Tibetan local government of its own accord. Consultations with local Tibet leaders shall be made when the people show desire for the reform."
The Central Government abided by both promises. However, a minority of upper-class Tibetans wanted their system to last forever rather than to make changes later, so they started the armed rebellion. Yet the incident brought the democratic reform in Tibet into reality earlier than expected.
Without the prologue of the peaceful liberation of Tibet, the magnificent democratic reform would not have happened; and without the peaceful liberation of Tibet, the entry of the Chinese Communist Party and the PLA, those oppressed and enslaved Tibetan people would not have deeply understood the policy of the CPC, nor would they show a strong desire for the democratic reform themselves.
During the 8 years after the peaceful liberation of Tibet, a set of preconditions had been objectively created for the Democratic Reform in terms of ideology, support from both masses and cadres and even experience of military struggle. The success of the Democratic Reform of Tibet signifies that there would be no ground for either theocratic feudal serfdom or retroversion in the history of Tibet.
Now, it made the Dalai clique and western rivalries behind uncomfortable to see the national reunification and the prosperous development of all ethnic groups including Tibetans in China. They may disagree with me on this stand, and give it another try for verification as they have done many times. But I believe that any such chance-takers will not end up better than those resisters who went against the peaceful liberation of Tibet or launched armed rebels against their motherland.

Dalai Lama spoils his wisest decision
Reporter: At first, the 14th Dalai Lama agreed on and supported the signing of the "17-Article Agreement", but later he broke his promise and fled overseas to engage himself in separatism. What's your comment on that?

Mr. Zhu: The Dalai Lama was only 16 years old and just came into power when the "17-Article Agreement" was signed. He specially sent plenipotentiary to Beijing for negotiations with the Central Government.
After the agreement was signed, he stated openly that he completely accepted the "17-Article Agreement" on behalf of the local government of Tibet, and also expressed in his telegram to Chairman Mao Zedong that "the local government of Tibet and all Tibetan monks and laymen all support the agreement, willing to help the People's Liberation Army go into Tibet under the leadership of the CPC to fortify the national defense, expel imperialistic forces and safeguard the unified territorial sovereignty of the country."
The decision turned out to be one of the Dalai Lama's few wisest decisions in his life.
The Central Government has given many favorable treatments to the Dalai Lama. For example, in 1954, Chairman Mao Zedong and Premier Zhou Enlai specially met with him when he attended the first session of the National People's Congress. At the meeting, he was elected vice chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress. The position in the state's top legislative body was preserved for him until 1964 after he fled in 1959, which the Central Government claimed a forced escape with the consideration of his personal reputation.
Unfortunately, it was the Dalai Lama himself who smeared his own reputation. In 1959, he imprudently alleged to reject  the "17-Article Agreement" during his journey fleeing overseas with a group of upper-class splittists. More than fifty years have passed since then.
In fact, the Dalai Lama knew well the goodwill of the Central Government, but he insisted going further in a wrong way. Given that, the State Council passed the decision of removing the official post preserved for the Dalai Lama in 1964.
In 1995, after careful studies on the Dalai Lama's sabotage activities in the past decades, the Central Government affirms four allegations over the Dalai Lama: the leader of the separatist clique that conspires the independence of Tibet, a ready puppet of the international anti-China forces, the root of social disorder in Tibet, and the biggest obstacle against regular religious order of Tibet Buddhism".
With the following separatist and sabotage words and deeds, the Dalai Lama continued to prove the eligibility for the four allegations. I feel bad for him as he has to die with those "four labels".

The "Middle Way" equals "Tibet Independence"

Reporter: What's your comment on the 14th Dalai Lama's so-called "Middle Way"? And what's your opinion about the Dalai Lama's position in his contact with the Central Government?

Mr. Zhu: In the 1980s, the 14th Dalai Lama came up with his so-called "non-violence" and "middle way" approach. Such a "non-violence" claim did not mean that he did not want violence, but only he had to turn around at a dead-end corner due to his notoriety.
During 1960s, the clique had continuously organized armed attacks along China's border areas and caused bloodshed to undermine the stability of Tibet.
Even after he claimed to follow his "Middle Way" approach, the Dalai clique continued to move behind the scenes and provoke a series of riots such as the "Lhasa Incident" in 1989, "March14 Lhasa Incident" in 2008, etc.  Also the Dalai clique backed up separatist organizations such as Tibetan Youth Congress, which publicly claims "Tibet independence" and favors violent terrorist attacks.
However, the Central Government would like to resolve the Tibet issue through peaceful talks with the Dalai Lama who was officially recognized by the National Government of the Republic of China (1927-1949).
China's policy toward the Tibet issue has been consistent and open: the Central Government is always ready for contact and talks with the 14th Dalai Lama over his personal future as long as he gives up his separatist stance and activities against the motherland, publicly admits that Tibet and Taiwan are both inalienable parts of China and accepts that the People's Republic of China is the sole legitimate government of China.
Therefore, the contact with the Dalai Lama mainly happened in two periods of time: from the early period when China just adopted the "reform and opening-up policy" to early 1990s; and from the year of 2002 till now. Personally, I have taken part in all the ten rounds of talks since 2002.
We have two basic points for contact with the Dalai Lama. The first point is that we only contact private representatives sent by the Dalai Lama. His so-called "government in exile", whoever leads it, is only an illegitimate political group of splittists not eligible for a "dialogue" with the representatives of the Central Government. To dismiss itself is the only thing the "government in exile" should do. With our presence, the representatives of Dalai Lama never dared to say that they represent the "government in exile", but they set themselves up as representatives of "government in exile" as soon as they leave the country. This is not a decent act, but a deliberate move to spoil our talks.
The second point is that we only talk about the future of the Dalai Lama, and a small group of people around him at most. In other words, it is a talk about how the Dalai Lama gives up his ideas and actions of splittism completely and tries to gain  the understanding of the Central Government and people all over China. We will never talk about the so-called Tibet issue and "high-degree autonomy of  Greater Tibet" with them. To let the Dalai Lama further understand the principles of the central government and admit his mistakes, we can listen to his explanations, but it is only a test for any of his inclinations to give up his splittist approach and get closer to the Central Government.
During the contact in 2008, the private representatives of the Dalai Lama handed in a "Memorandum on Genuine Autonomy of the Tibetan People", which was rejected by us immdiately. But now the Dalai clique still shams that they are still "waiting for the central government's response". I would suggest they'd better stop such a self-delusional act.
Since we resumed our contact in 2002, we were once again disappointed by the Dalai Lama as he instigated a series of violent activities, including the March 14 Riots in Lhasa in 2008, interrupting the passing-on of the Beijing Olympic torch, inciting western countries to boycott Beijing Olympic Games and so on aiming to force us make a concession by taking advantage of the Beijing Olympic Games, which ended with nothing but another failure.
During the contact in 2008, the representatives of the Dalai Lama found that they could not achieve their goals, so they declared on site that they would never talk with the Central Government. This was already their second time to do so since 1993. Several months later, as expected, they asked for another round of contact because they found the situation was not favorable for them.
Recently, the unstable situation in the Middle East excited the Dalai Lama and Tibetan Youth Congress for another possbile opportunity.However, they never seem to make the right judgment or give the right action thus their decisions doom to failure over and over again.
In terms of the contact, we would like to stress that foreigners are not allowed to be involved. All Tibet-related issues are internal affairs of China, which should not be interfered by any other country. The Dalai clique insists on engaging foreigners in our contacts as some westerners actively offer to be "a third party". It is out of the question. I would suggest they reserve some respect for themselves.
Recently there are some discussions about the change of the office-term of the "government in exile" and the Central Government's attitude towards the contact. Now I want to make it clear: all the above basic points will not change. Of course, it will be a different matter if the Dalai Lama advocates publicly the "Tibet independence" or "armed riots".

Reporter: The Central Government has held five conferences on work in Tibet. What does it indicate?

Mr. Zhu: As far as I know, Tibet is the only provincial-level autonomous region for which the Central Government has held five conferences dedicated to its development since the implementation of the reform and opening-up policy. Why？
First of all, Tibet is located in a high-altitude, rigid, cold area where natural condition is extremely harsh, which is a special barrier for Tibet's economic and social development. Secondly, for a long time in history, Tibet had been ruled under the theocratic feudal serfdom system, which impeded its social development. So its development level is far behind the inland areas. Thirdly, the Dalai clique, under the support of anti-China western forces, has always conspired in splitting Tibet from its motherland and causing trouble to disturb the stability of Tibet, stifle its development, and threaten the national unity ,and territorial integrity of the country. Fourthly, Tibet in southwestern China shares long boarder borders with neighboring sub-continental South Asian countries. The stability and development of Tibet is important for China to maintain the friendly, cooperative and mutual beneficial relationships with those countries.
In a word, the above reasons determine the unique position of Tibet in the overall blueprint of the country. Both the Central Government and people are clear about the situation, so they are determined to stick to the policy of pooling national efforts to support the development of Tibet.
For example, the Central Government decided to call for all the government departments and 15 other provincial-level regions to aid Tibet at the third conference on work in Tibet held in 1994.  Altogether 62 key aid-Tibet projects have been implemented. In 2001, the fourth conference on work in Tibet decided to extend the planned aid-Tibet timetable from 10 years to 20 years, with 59 central government departments, 18 provincial-level regions and 17 state enterprises involved in the ambitious project to cover all prefecture-level cities and 74 counties  in Tibet. During the 11th Five-Year Plan period (2006-2010), the overall aid-Tibet fund amounted to 7.6 billion yuan. The fifth conference on work in Tibet stepped further ahead, calling for all aid-Tibet partner provinces and cities to use one thousandth of its disposable revenue to support the development of Tibet, which was accepted and accomplished without hesitation.
For so many years, a large number of inland cadres have left home to help Tibet enthusiastically. Facts show  that it has been a nationwide consensus to help with Tibet's progress.
We believe that the 3-million Tibetans who have taken aid and support from the whole nation are giving their own support to the country in return.
People of different minorities lived in Tibet from the ancient time have made unique material and cultural progress despite the high altitude, cold climate, thin air and extremely fragile eco-environment. They are also the guardians of the 1.2 million square-kilometer territory in the southwestern part of China.  In the past 60 years since the peaceful liberation of the region, Tibet has maintained stability and steady growth, turning itself into an important shield of security and ecological environment, a strategic resource reserve, a high-land distinctive agricultural product base of the country, as well as a Chinese ethnic culture protection center, and a world-renewed tourism destination. Officials and ordinary people from different ethnic backgrounds in Tibet have shown their lofty patriotism and hard-working spirit on the physically challenging plateau, which has served as an inspiration for the whole nation. This is what the Tibetans have returned to us all.
Tibetan culture gets along well with inland culture

Reporter: As secretary general of China Association for Preservation and Development of Tibetan Culture (CAPDTC), what's your comment on traditional Tibetan culture?

Mr. Zhu: The traditional Tibetan culture is an important part of the traditional Chinese culture. Over thousands of years, the Tibetan culture has been in complete harmony and closer bonds with the inland culture.
Let me show you an example. When you visit the Potala Palace or famous monasteries in Lhasa, look at the golden roof and bracket building style (a system of brackets inserted between the top of a column and a crossbeam), which is definitely similar to the architecture in inland areas of China. Also look at the painting, dance, sculpture, medicine, calendar, religion and so on, you can clearly feel the profound influence of inland culture (on the Tibetan culture) during the past thousands of years.
Just as you can also feel the great influence of Tibetan culture on the inland culture when visiting the Yonghegong Lamasery in Beijing or "Eight Temples" in Chengde (Hebei Province) or Bodhisattva Monastery at Mount Wutai (Shanxi Province). The Tibetan culture has been continuously instilling vigor to the inland culture, both in content and style.
The traditional Tibetan culture is also a distinctive part of traditional Chinese culture. It boasts plateau-featured lively regional characteristics which have drawn on the unique elements of the spirit of the Tibetan people and inspirations of the sub-continental South Asian culture.
Only with such factors can Tibetan culture and inland culture produce the best of itself through learning and attracting from each other and exchanges between both sides.

Reporter：What is the relationship between the traditional Tibetan culture and the socialistic new culture?

Mr. Zhu: It is a universal law in cultural development that traditional culture evolves with the social and economic development. Now our traditional culture is developing as we have entered the new phase of the country's socialistic construction with Chinese characteristics. The traditional Tibetan culture is for sure to progress with the times. And, the improvement of people's material life will no longer remain as it was. .
Former Chairman Mao once said, "To develop new national culture and elevate national confidence, it is necessary to sort out the old culture, and eliminate its feudal dross, and assimilate its democratic essence. But we should never take everything uncritically. It is imperative to differentiate democratic and revolutionary contents of the people in old times from all the rotten waste favored by the old feudal ruling class."
Traditional Tibetan culture originates from old times, inevitably carrying along some feudalistic serfdom dross belonging to the past, which should be abandoned as the society develops. Yet positive and advanced elements which can go along with the historical trend should be inherited and carried forward.
Now in an effort to build the socialistic new Tibet, we will definitely create unprecedented cultural substances and forms to reflect the new era and new society, offering the masses a kind of culture on the serving-the-people basis, readily accepted by the people.
Some westerners regard ancient Tibetan culture as incomparably sacred, not allowing any bit of change. In fact, what they want is to makeTibet as an antediluvian, keeping Tibetan people in a culturally outdated, even fatuous state so that they themselves could keep enjoying the superiority over ordinary people.
The Dalai clique blames us for  "destroying" Tibetan culture all along, but what they actually want is to recover their cultural superiority they had exclusively under the feudal serfdom.
Our proposition in cultural development is to meet the need of the people from all ethnic groups in living their new socialistic life, neither to satisfy the racial pride of some westerners nor to fulfill the desire of a handful of former privileged stratum in old Tibet.
Nowadays, the development of our country provides Tibetan culture with unprecedentedly favorable conditions and broad prospects.
New cultural forms and categories have emerged in large numbers in many fields of Tibetan culture, such as the language, newspaper, radio and TV broadcasting, architecture, art, photography, dancing, singing, and fashion, etc. Moreover, each cultural pattern is developing rapidly , stepping further to connect the traditional with  modern culture.
Artistic works reflecting Tibet and presenting Tibetan culture  such as  photography  or art exhibitions are almost seen everywhere across the country. The Tibetan songs such as "Ya la so" or "Ba zha hai" (Tibetan interjections) are commonly heard from professional or amateur singers, and also very popular among the people. Such cultural prosperity was unimaginable in old Tibet.
The CAPDTC will incumbently adapt to the historical trend, exerting more efforts in promoting Tibetan culture and  exhancing its nationwide and even global influence. At the same time we are also committed ourselves to introducing other excellent cultures to Tibet to enrich local Tibetan people's cultural life.

Salt, garlic and other rushes

Reproduced below, an important article found on Chinascope website.
It shows the poor credibility of the Chinese Government.  Mao's era is far away. At that time, each and every Chinese citizen would believe the words of the Chairman. 
It is true that during these days, it was better not to show your doubts about the Great Helmsman's policies .
Those who dared saying that China had a food problem during the Great Leap Forward, (like Marshal Peng Dehuai), had to pay the heavy price for expressing their disagreement.
It is not that Indian citizens have a great confidence in their own government, but even if the credibility is about the same level in India as in China, the difference is a free press, a free uncensored Internet access and an independent judiciary. 
As a result, the Kalmanis, Rajas and co are now hosted by Tihar Jail officials.
As long as China lives under the dictatorship of one Party (the dictatorship of the proletariat does not exist since long), there is little chance that the Chinese leadership finds again some credence in the eyes of the ‘common men’.
However despite many restrictions, Internet has started playing an important role to fight corruption and injustice in China.
In the coming years, the response of the Government will remain the same, 'let us keep stability': “The local governments take measures against the farmers, saying they are a threat to stability and try to resolve it in order to maintain order. Our inability to solve these conflicts suggests that our thinking about maintaining stability is quite limited” says the article.
But when it comes to external 'enemies', Chinese citizens are unanimously ready to believe their government. Amazing!

The Credibility of China’s Government Is Dangerously Low 
Chinascope 
[Editor’s Note: Several articles in the Chinese media have criticized the government of China, saying it has lost its credibility with its citizens, who now have no trust or confidence in the authorities. For the majority of the people, casting doubt on whatever the government says has become a habit, as the followings excerpts from some articles show.]

1. “Please Try to Let Me Trust You” [1]
“Many online top stories, including the ‘Bleached Mushroom’ investigation case in Beijing and Yueqing’s case in Zhen Jiang [2], have become a mirror reflecting the trust factors of the local governments and news media. Today, the sentiment of ‘mistrust’ has penetrated into the very fabric of Chinese people’s lives: when we Chinese eat, we can’t trust the safety of our food; when we travel, we can’t trust the ability or sincerity of the railroad industry to solve the problem of the shortage of tickets; when we go to the hospital, we can’t trust that the doctor won’t over-prescribe medication; when we go to court, we can’t trust that the judiciary system will make a just decision. …
“We were full of trust in everything in the past: the leaders, the revolution, the end of capitalism, the bright future of communism … but now we can’t trust anything: what the local government’s say, media reports, the people next to us, and particularly ‘it has become the habit of most people to question whatever the government says.’
“Nowadays, suspicion and alerts have become the way of life for Chinese people, because there are so many unimaginable incidents constantly taking place. If we talk about where we live, there are buildings that have collapsed or are unstable, tilted, and poorly built; about what we eat, we have to be careful about fake cigarettes, liquor, eggs, milk, waste water trench oil [3], synthetic fat, bleached rice, bean sprouts soaked in contaminated water, turtles fed with contraceptive drugs, deep-fried flour sticks made with detergent powder; about where we go outside of our home, we need to be careful about sales people, con artists, and law enforcement officers (who can fine you for anything); about going to the hospital, we are concerned about fake drugs, unlicensed doctors, or being “over-treated” (The Hong Kong Sun newspaper recently disclosed that China consumed 10.4 billion bottles of IV fluid last year, an average of 8 bottles per person.) Moreover, we need to deal with fake tickets, fake licenses, fake lotteries, bank fraud, fake tigers [4], and fake news.
“All of sudden, the ‘conspiracy theory’ is all over China’s Internet. Sometimes, the more clarifications the government puts out, the more questions Internet users have. The Guardian made the following comments: ‘The display of mistrust over such incidents (referring to the death of village head and activist Qian Yunhui in the Yueqing’s case) shows the scale of the credibility challenge the authorities face. Conspiracy theories flourish online in all countries, but they have a particularly strong appeal in China.’ Professor Huang Yasheng at MIT also said, ‘No matter what caused the death of Mr. Qian, considering the focus of the media coverage, wouldn’t this display a type of crisis? If you were a government official, wouldn’t you feel worried and concerned?’
“Last year, an 11-year-old elementary student in Beijing conducted a simple food safety test with the assistance of his teacher. He found that, out of 14 types of fresh mushrooms he selected randomly, 13 were bleached. At the same time, the Beijing Food Safety office carried out an “official” investigation and claimed that 97 percent of the mushrooms sold in Beijing’s market tested negative for bleach and were therefore safe to eat. On the one hand an elementary student does a random investigation; on the other hand, the government’s official publishes an official statement. Who would you trust? In a survey of 1100 people, most trusted the results of the elementary student–only 8 said they trusted the government’s report.
“Trust in children is not limited to the general public. Certain government agencies, publicly or semi-publicly, have shown their distrust of adults. The Liangzhou District in Wuwei City, Gansu Province, assigned 18 Communist Party Young Pioneers (all students under age 14) to monitor a written test conducted in their public security and judiciary department in July 2009. By the end of the test, 25 participants had been caught cheating. The public security and judiciary department is charged with the responsibility of safeguarding social justice. How ironic that it would employ under-aged children to monitor its own internal test.
“Social conflict from housing demolition directly reduces the public’s trust in the government. … All of these instances reflect the conflict between officials and civilians. The reasons are deeply rooted. The current rash of incidents in the countryside is mostly related to land confiscation, forced-demolition, and forced-relocation. [5] Farmers try to protect their rights, which has caused conflicts with local governments. The local governments take measures against the farmers, saying they are a threat to stability and try to resolve it in order to maintain order. Our inability to solve these conflicts suggests that our thinking about maintaining stability is quite limited.
“Public trust in the regional governments has declined in the past two years. … In summary, the mass incidents involve protecting farmers’ rights during land confiscation and relocation. They also reflect what governments think ‘stability’ is when there is a conflict between our mentality of maintaining stability and farmers’ protection of their rights. Concerns about the farmers can’t be considered an instability factor and should be handled properly. We need to adjust our mentality about maintaining stability. Public trust basically involves these two fundamental issues. The issue of farmers’ rights not only covers land confiscation but also involves rights to cemetery plots, mineral exploration rights, and local farmers’ rights, and environmental issues.”

2. The Salt Rush in China
[Editor’s Note: A recent rush to buy up salt in China, after Japan’s nuclear leak at the Fukushima plant, is a further example of what little trust and confidence the public has in the government. On March 16, 2011, people in the coastal cities on the Mainland rushed to buy iodized salt. On March 18, the salt rush spread throughout China. Many stores ran out of salt, and people bought soy sauce and other salt replacements instead.]
“According to a Shanghai resident, Cai Wenjun, the salt rush was caused, to a large extent, by TV news. She said, ‘Some people say that due to the radioactive impact of the Japan earthquake, salt from a contaminated ocean will not be edible. Then the TV news tried to quash the rumor and said it would not impact the Mainland. However, the people on the Mainland have lost confidence in the government. Every time the government makes some high profile statement, it means the truth is exactly the opposite. Starting on March 16th, all salt in stores (in Shanghai) had completely sold out, and the next day even all of the soy sauce was gone. I think the government orchestrated all of this. For example, milk products contain melamine, port has traces of clenbuterol, glutinous rice wine includes preservatives, and Sudan Red was found in salted duck eggs. Didn’t the government deny all of it?  Yet these violations are real and are continuing today.’
“Postings online said that, while the salt rush did show some people blindly following along, in fact what it highlights is the total absence of any social credibility or sense of security. In their personal experiences, the people who participated in the salt rush felt there was no one—no person or government department—that they could trust. They felt safe only when they could physically possess the resource in question, in this case, salt. One can laugh at their ignorance, but it is a clear demonstration of a deep social crisis.
“Internet writer Li Li pointed out, ‘Chinese authorities unleashed some so-called experts to quash the rumor that edible salt is not from the sea but from salt mines. From my personal experience, this is untrue. Even if sea salt is not contaminated at this time, the Communist Party consistently went all out after previous major safety accidents to cover up the truth. That has led to people’s complete loss of trust and confidence in the government. So if sea salt were contaminated due to nuclear radiation, the authorities would certainly cover it up and not notify the people. It does not mean our people are stupid, but, rather, our people are rational. Many postings online also concurred that this brief incident exposes the extent to which the Communist Party’s credibility has become bankrupt.’ The salt rush, in fact, is a public referendum, a no-confidence vote against the Communist Party.” [6]
“Another fact that one cannot ignore is that, as a result of long-term suppression, the entire country has plunged into utter confusion and distrust. We truly feel the pendulum twist and swing between truth and lies. Take the example of earthquake predictions. After an earthquake, officials often say that earthquakes cannot be accurately predicted. [7] When there really are indications of earthquakes, the authorities, using experts, assert that earthquakes will not occur. [8] So many incidents like this have happened. Step by step, people have lost their trust and confidence in the government and its experts; now, none feel safe and secure.
"For several years now, minor events have resulted in panic. It reflects deep social problems in China. ‘The garlic rush’ [9] and ‘the iodized salt rush’ are not terrible.  What is really alarming is the fear and mistrust that these incidents have, again and again, brought out. When rumors start to spread, in addition to actively clearing the rumors, the authorities should look at themselves and search for the underlying cause. Re-building the social mechanism to restore public trust and credibility is the key to the ultimate cure." [10]

Endnotes:
[1] International Herald Leader, “Please Try to Let Me Trust You,” January 17, 2011.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/herald/2011-01/17/c_13694007.htm.
[2] Editor’s Note: Mr. Qian Yunhui was a village manager in Yueqing City, Zhejiang Province. He died on December 25, 1010, after a construction truck rolled over him. Several times before his death, he had reported how the local government had illegally taken villagers’ land for construction projects. Though the police and government immediately stated that his death was an accident, some claimed that witnesses had reported seeing unidentified people push or throw Qian under a truck. Public opinion on the web overwhelmingly suspected that the government had deliberately arranged to have him killed. The recently disappeared Ai Weiwei also looked into his case.
[3] Editor’s Note: Many Chinese restaurants dump their used oil into waste water trenches. Some people collect the oil from the trenches and reuse it when they cook food to sell.
[4] Editor’s Note: On October 12, 2007, Zhou Zhenglong, a peasant in Shaanxi Province, reported that he had seen a South China Tiger, a critically endangered species, in a forest. Zhou also presented a picture of the tiger that he claimed he took in the forest. Since then, many people, including government researchers have pointed out that the picture was a fake. However, the local government kept reassuring the public that the picture was real (so that they could attract tourists). Eight months later, the Shaanxi Province government declared the picture was a fake and ended the charade.
[5] Editor’s Note: In many land confiscation and forced-demolition cases in China, the local government offers a significantly below market price for residents’ houses. The local government then re-sells the land at a much higher price in order to profit from taking over the land. The residents suffer a great loss but they cannot really argue with the government. They face forced-demolition if they refuse to move out.
[6] Epoch Times, “The Earthquake Hasn’t Settled Yet, But People Are Already in Chaos in Buying up Salt: All Stirred up by CCTV,” March 19, 2011.
http://www.epochtimes.com/b5/11/3/19/n3202606.htm.
[7] Editor’s Note: Referring to how the Chinese government did not warn the public about the Wenchuan Earthquake, but afterwards only claimed that the earthquake could not have been accurately predicted.
[8] Editor’s Note: This refers to the fact that official earthquake experts claimed that there would be no earthquake at all in Qinghai Province, even though earthquake rumors had been spreading. On April 14, 2010, less than a month (after the rumors started), Yushu County, Qinghai Province had a 7.1 level earthquake.
[9] Editor’s Note: When SARS was spreading in China, a rumor circulated that garlic could prevent SARS, which caused a “garlic rush” in China.
[10] Sichuan Online, “The Trust Crisis behind the Salt Shortage,” March 18, 2011.
http://comment.scol.com.cn/html/2011/03/011009_843437.shtml.

Tibetan Soap Opera with Chinese Characteristics.

While repression is every day harsher on the Tibetan plateau, the Chinese TV (CCTV) has decided to offer to its mainland public, a new 'Tibetan' soap opera with purely Chinese characteristics.
Will it help create a better understanding between the different 'nationalities'? Certainly not. 
One of the few Chinese who did an effort to understand the Tibetans was CCP General Secretary Hu Yaobang. 
In May 1980 in Lhasa, during a party meeting organized to celebrate the 1951 Agreement, Hu gave a powerful political speech to some 5,000 cadres in Lhasa. The motto was 'Strive to build a united, prosperous and civilized new Tibet'. In the speech Hu listed a few tasks for Tibet. Hu very frankly admitted:

Our present situation is less than wonderful because the Tibetan people's lives have not been much improved. There are some improvements in some parts, but in general, Tibetans still live in relative poverty. In some areas the living standards have even gone down. We comrades in the Central Committee, Chairman Hua as well as several vice-chairmen, were very upset when we heard about this situation. We feel that our party has let the Tibetan people down. We feel very bad! The sole purpose of our Communist Party is to work for the happiness of people, to do good things for them. We have worked nearly thirty years, but the life of the Tibetan people has not been notably improved. Are we not to blame? If we don't make this clear, people won't let us off the hook; party members won't let us get away with it!

Wang Yao, an assistant of Hu Yaobang later wrote: “he was open and honest, dared to act, dared to face reality and dared bear responsibility.”
From the time of the ‘liberation’ till today, it was probably the first and the last time that a Communist leader accepted the Communist Party’s mistakes in Tibet and tried to remedy them.
'Tibetan' soap operas can only bring more tourists to Tibet; it will not build a bridge between Han and Tibetan cultures.

Tibetan TV series to be broadcast today
China Tibet Online
2011-05-06
Shangri-la, the newly produced TV series on intriguing Tibetan stories is all set for broadcasting through CCTV Channel 1 at 10:30 pm starting from May 6, 2011, news from its launching press conference Wednesday afternoon.
The 30-episode TV series, directed by HK director Jiang Jiajun (also director of a number of Hong Kong films in 1990s and recent mainland TV series), is starred with a troupe of first-line actresses and young actors.
Tibetan actor Tashi Dundrup is also acting a leading role in this story happened in 1930s, which is trying to probe the harmony and conflicts between human beings tangled with love, hatred and national responsibility.

"With many advanced filming techniques, we want to present conflicts among people from different backgrounds and Tibetan sceneries for audiences", said director Jiang Jiajun.
Different from "Shangri-la"-themed movies, the series try to present a whole picture of Tibet in more aspects, such as Tibetan Tusi (native chieftain, an old title in southwest China in Ming Dynasty and Qing Dynasty), local horse caravans, friendship between local people of ethnic minorities and the Red Army, Chinese people fighting against the aggression of the Japanese Army.
In addition to inviting Hu Ge, a popular image among young Chinese, and adopting the impressive fight choreographer used in film "Let Bullets Fly", a good number of horse-riding or gun-shooting battle clips between different groups have brought the producer more confidence about the ratings from the audience.
 In the background, the TV series have used much picturesque scenery in Yunnan Province, e.g. ecological features from Shangri-la, Lijiang, Dali, Tsongzanlin Temple, Baishui Tai (said to be the origin of Naxi ethnic group), Hu Tiaoxia to Meri Snow Mountain.

India-China War and the Tibet Factor

The 1962 War has deeply traumatized India, while the Chinese leader have never been much bothered about the slap that they gave to Nehru.
However, the Tibetan uprising of 1959 and the subsequent flight of the Dalai Lama to India seems to have left profound scars in the Chinese psyche. 
In an excellent paper on China's Decision for War with India in 1962, John Garver, an American scholar mentions the 'Tibet' factor as the one of main reasons for Mao to go with India. 
He quotes Chinese sources to prove that the Communist leadership believed that India wanted to make Tibet an independent nation or at least of 'buffer zone'. 
A study of Nehru's papers shows that Beijing was completely wrong. It was never the intention of the first Prime Minister of India to provide support to the Tibetans refugees to regain their independence.
Apparently, 52 years after the Dalai Lama took refuge in India, China continues to worry about this. 


(Extracts from China's Decision for War with India in 1962 by John W. Garver)
Tibet and the 1962 War: The Chinese View of the Root Cause
There is unanimous agreement among Chinese scholars that the root cause of the 1962 war was an Indian attempt to undermine Chinese rule and seize Tibet. The official PLA history of the 1962 war argues that India sought to turn Tibet into a "buffer zone" (huanzhongguo). Creation of such a buffer zone had been the objective of British imperial strategy, and Nehru was a ‘complete successor’ to Britain in this regard. Nehru's objective was creation of a ‘great Indian empire’ in South Asia by ‘filling the vacuum’ left by British exit from that region. Control over Tibet was, Nehru felt, essential for ‘mastery over South Asia, and the most economical method for guaranteeing India's security’.
A study by Xu Yan, professor at the PLA's National Defense University and one of China's foremost military historians, follows the same line of argument: Nehru aspired and worked consistently throughout the 1950s to turn Tibet into a ‘buffer zone’. According to Xu, Nehru imbibed British imperialist ideology, and believed that India should dominate neighboring countries. He quotes Nehru and other early Congress Party leaders about their aspirations that India should lead and organize the Indian Ocean region. The Indian independence struggle was also marred by an emphasis on ‘pure nationalism’ — communist-jargon for non-Marxist nationalism not underpinned by a ‘class analysis’. Regarding Tibet, Nehru aspired to turn that region into a ‘buffer zone’ between China and India. This was Nehru's consistent objective throughout the 1950s. The ‘decisive factor’ in the deterioration of Sino-Indian relations, according to Xu Yan, was Nehru's policy of ‘protecting’ the Tibetan ‘splittists’ after the Lhasa rebellion of March 1959.
An article by Wang Hongwei of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and one of China's senior India hands, presents a similar view. Prior to 1947, Britain's objective, Wang argues, was to bring Tibet within its ‘sphere of influence’. Britain sought ‘Tibetan independence’, and continually attempted to instigate Tibet to ‘leave China’ (touli zhongguo). Nehru was deeply influenced by this British thinking, Wang argued, through education in Britain and by assimilation of the mentality of the British ruling class. In 1959, the Indian government ‘supported the Tibetan rebels’, permitted them to carry out ‘anti-China activities’ on Indian territory, and even gave some Tibetan rebels military training. Simultaneous with this, India advanced claims on Chinese territory. Implicitly but clearly, the purpose of India doing this was to achieve Tibetan ‘independence’ by instigating Tibet to ‘leave China’.
One of the most extensive and nuanced Chinese accounts of events leading up to the 1962 war is by Zhao Weiwen, long time South Asian analyst of the Ministry of State Security. Zhao's account of the road to war also begins with Tibet and attribution of aggressive motives to Indian policy moves. From 1947 to 1952, Zhao writes, "India ardently hoped to continue England's legacy in Tibet." The ‘essence’ of English policy had been to "tamper with China's sovereignty in Tibet to change it to 'suzerainty' thereby throwing off the jurisdiction of China's central government over Tibet under the name of Tibetan autonomy." (shishi shang shi yao ba zhongguo zai xizang de zhuquan cuangai wei 'zongzhuquan', shi xizang zai 'zizhi' de mingyi xia, touli zhongyang zhengfu de guanxia).
By 1952, however, the PLA's victories in Korea, in Xikang province, the conclusion of the 17 Point Agreement of May 1951, the PLA's occupation of Tibet, and Beijing’s forceful rejection of Indian efforts to check the PLA's move into Tibet, forced Nehru to change course. Nehru now began direct talks with Beijing over Tibet. There were, however, ‘right wing forces’ in India who ‘refused to abandon the English legacy’ in Tibet and who pressured Nehru in 1959. Moreover, Nehru himself ‘harbored a sort of dark mentality’ (huaiyou moxie yinan xinli), the exact nature of which is not specified but which presumably included aggressive designs on Tibet. These factors led Nehru to demonstrate an ‘irresolute attitude’ (taidu bu jinyue) in 1959. On the one hand he said that Tibet was a part of China and that he did not want to interfere in China's internal affairs. On the other hand, he permitted all sorts of ‘anti-China activities and words’ aimed against China's exercise of sovereignty over Tibet. Zhao is more sensitive than other Chinese analysts to the domestic political pressures weighing on Nehru in 1959. Yet even she suggests that Nehru's ‘dark mentality’ led him to give free reign to ‘anti China forces’ in an attempt to cause Tibet to "throw off the jurisdiction of China's central government."
The attribution to India by contemporary Chinese scholars of a desire to seize Tibet mirrors — as we shall see below — the thinking of Chinese leaders who decided to launch that war. This is probably due to the fact that published scholarship in China is still expected to explain and justify, not to criticize the decisions of the Chinese Communist Party, at least on such sensitive matters as war and peace.

Hardly any Chinese in Tibet?

According to Chinese statistics, the number of "permanent residents in southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region has topped 3 million, at least 90 percent of whom are native Tibetans."
In other words, hardly 10% belong to the Han majority and minorities such as Hui Muslims.
Xinhua reports: "According to figures from the sixth national census conducted last year, the number of Tibet's permanent residents has reached 3,002,166, up 14.75 percent from the previous census in 2000."
In 1993, after a short visit to Tibet, I wrote an article Shangrila no more for Blitz: 

"To go back to the hotel (I was already late), I decided to experiment with a rickshaw drive. After bargaining the price with a rickshawalla, I had a relaxed journey to the hotel some 3 km away. While watching my Chinese rickshaw driver pedaling I was in deep thought: there are now tens of thousands of such Chinese men doing petty work in Lhasa. For many years, the Chinese in Tibet were only PLA personnel and bureaucrats posted by Beijing, but since a few years the Chinese .policy seems to have changed and now there is an organised transfer of population from China to Tibet. This population occupies even the lowest jobs in the society, which in practical terms leaves very little scope for the local Tibetan people. If the Chinese are tailors, shoemakers, rickshawallas, coolies what is left for the Tibetans to do except to beg? A recent census shows that out of 12,500 shops surveyed in Lhasa more than 12,000 are Chinese. For me, it was interesting that I had read this article just before leaving for Lhasa, but like many articles one reads, one does not really realise concretely what it implies. It sank home in Lhasa and in particular in Jokhang when I 'saw that the people selling Khatas (Tibetan ceremonial scarves) were Chinese; that the tailors stitching Prayers Flags were Chinese. It is very frightening to think of the future of the Tibetan civilisation."

This was in 1993. Today the Chinese want us to believe that there is only 10% of non-Tibetans in Tibet. 
They really take the rest of the world for fools.

Tibet's Population Tops 3 Million; 90% are Tibetans
2011-05-04
Xinhua   
The number of permanent residents in southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region has topped 3 million, at least 90 percent of whom are native Tibetans, the regional government said Wednesday.
According to figures from the sixth national census conducted last year, the number of Tibet's permanent residents has reached 3,002,166, up 14.75 percent from the previous census in 2000, Tibet's regional bureau of statistics said in a press release.
It said Tibet's population had witnessed an annual 1.4 percent growth rate, faster than the national average growth of 0.57 percent.
However, the average number of people per household dropped slightly compared with the 2000 figure, it said.
The latest census found Tibet's 670,835 households had an average of 4.23 people each, down from the average 4.75 people per household in 2000.
China's one child policy does not apply to Tibetans, and farming and herding Tibetan families often have two children or more.
The 2.716 million Tibetans make up about 90.48 percent of Tibet's total population, whereas the Han, China's most populous ethnic group, account for 8.17 percent. Other ethnic groups make up 1.35 percent of the permanent residents in Tibet.
Xigaze is the most populated Tibetan prefecture, with 703,292 residents, followed by Qamdo, Lhasa, Nagqu, Shannan, Nyingchi and Ngari.
The latest census also found that people living in Tibet were better educated compared with the 2000 census result. The number of college graduates per 100,000 residents soared from 1,282 to 5,507, and at least 17,200 out of every 100,000 finished secondary school, as opposed to 9,891 in 2000.
Tibet is China's least-populated provincial-level region. Its population was only 1.23 million in 1959, the year the Chinese central government launched democratic reform there.

How many bin Ladens?

(In October 2001, nearly ten years ago, I wrote this article for Rediff.com. The point that I was trying to make is still valid. There are many bin Laden, the 'American' bin Laden may be dead, but the 'Indian' ones are still roaming freely around Pakistan, courtesy the ISI and the Pakistani Army. One certitude however, India will not act like the United States.)

During the last presidential campaign in the United States, George W Bush, Jr, is reported to have been asked by an interviewer the names of three prime ministers of Asian nations. The would-be-president knew none, but he told the journalist that as president of the United States he did not need to know these things personally; his advisers would know. Two of these countries were India and Pakistan.
One can presume that after the tragic events of September 11, the President's advisers would have briefed him on the names of Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Pervez Musharraf. But one detail has been left out from his aides' briefing: they have restricted 'terrorism' to one man [Osama bin Laden] and one nation [Afghanistan].
India has been suffering from terrorism for too many years to remain quiet. Nobody should forget that the number of innocent people killed in the state of Jammu & Kashmir in the last 12 years is greater than the number of people who died during the fateful crash of the twin towers. One cannot minimise this inhuman act, but it would be criminal to brush aside the deaths of all these innocent Kashmiris, particularly Kashmiri Pandits.
Of course, President Musharraf will say that in Kashmir, we only witness the struggle of a people for freedom, while the strike on America was pure terrorism. On October 8, a communiqué issued from Islamabad stated: "The Pakistan President today once again described the situation in Kashmir as a 'freedom struggle' and said it was not related to what had been happening in Afghanistan."
One can understand that the American president has inherited from his predecessors the habit of seeing events in black or white. In all good American Western movies, there is a good guy and a bad one. In more sophisticated scripts, you can have the good, the bad and the ugly. During the Gulf War, the good one was the American and the bad one was Saddam Hussein. In today's scenario, the good one is the same, but we now have an ugly one named Osama bin Laden.
The problem is that real life is sometimes more complicated than a Hollywood script. There are countless subtleties, intricacies, knots within knots, especially in an area, which, in the 19th century, was the playground for the 'Great Game'. Even if the US president's advisers seem sometimes unaware that the new Afghan scenario is not a movie script, the American press is becoming more and more conscious of the complexity of the situation.
This perhaps explains the delayed action against the bad guys. We can even assume that within the US administration, there are discordant voices. The mere fact that it took four weeks for America and its allies to decide to bomb the strategic Taleban positions shows that, for the first time, the administration has taken time to try to analyse the situation and learn from experience.
Nevertheless, it appears that for some time, they will stick to the script of 'one enemy only' and agree with Musharraf that on the right, there is 'terrorism' and on the left, a 'freedom struggle'.
But how long can the US and its allies close their eyes and act like ostriches? On October 3, the Pakistani press reported that a massive rally was organised by one of the factions of the Jamaat-e-Ulema-i-Islam in Quetta the previous day. "There was no mistake about the 'anti-American sentiment' among those who turned up," wrote an Indian daily.
That day, the leaders of the Council for the Defence of Afghanistan, representing major religious parties in Pakistan, decided to cancel their proposed trip to Kandahar to meet the Taleban chief, Mullah Mohammed Omar. One of these leaders was Qazi Hussain Ahmed, chief of the Jamaat-e-Islami, who refused to be part of the delegation of the ulema to persuade the Taleban leadership to hand over Laden.
The fact that more 'moderate' religious leaders finally went to Kandahar, accompanied by the director general of the ISI, and eventually pledged their support to the Taleban shows the extent of resentment, even amongst so-called moderate clerics in Pakistan, against the US putting a brake on Islamic jihads.
In this context, it is interesting to look at an interview of the same Jamaat chief, Qazi Hussain Ahmed, who once was adviser to General Zia-ul-Haq. It was published in February 1999 in a monthly Baluchi magazine Jamhooria Islamia.
The interview begins with the rights of women. The qazi makes it clear that once in power, the JI will abolish the voting rights of women and minorities who will be forced to become Muslims "either by monetary or psychological factors". Wanting to establish a khalifa with mullahs (plus three or four generals) at its head, the qazi states: "We are keenly watching the progress of the Taleban and learning from it. We are impressed with the Taleban on the women issue, minorities issue and law-and-order issue."
The interviewer comments that Mullah Omar is a great friend of the qazi. "Omar had visited his house many times. In the tentative talks, they had decided to form a union of Pakistan and Afghanistan once the right conditions are set in Pakistan."
The qazi's interview continues: "Our motto is constant jihad. The idea is to keep Pakistan in a constant state of jihad all the time." His vision is that "Pakistan will be the centre of the new Islamic empire that stretches from Burma to Afghanistan and from Sri Lanka to Tajikistan, including Kashmir. Towards that end, the Jamaat will use all tactics from terrorism in the kafir-controlled areas to negotiations in the Muslim-controlled areas."
The discussion/interview goes on in a similar tone. We will quote one last answer from the qazi. When the interviewer tells him that "it looks like the entire India policy of Jamaat revolves around Kashmir", he answers: "Yes that is true. But that is for a very good reason. See, Kashmir is like a keystone that sits on top of the arch. It is true that the arch holds the entire weight of the keystone. But if you remove the keystone, the whole arch falls down. Kashmir is the keystone for India. Once you remove that, India can no longer be secular and it will not be a united country, all the bricks will fall down."
Ahmed admits that it was on his advice that General Zia had started 'Operation Topac'. But he makes it clear that "Operation Topac's idea is not to get Kashmir for Pakistan as thought of by Indian analysts. Operation Topac is much more. The ultimate aim of Operation Topac is to break India into a million pieces so that it is easy for Pakistan to swallow India one piece at a time."
One general departed and ten years later another entered. The same obsession of Kashmir being the 'cornerstone' remained. A new plan was drawn up by the new 'commando' general to conquer Kashmir. The first step was to take over the Srinagar-Leh link and cut Ladakh off from the rest of the state. The plan did not work as planned, but the general did not forget his objectives and 'diplomatically' tried his chance in Agra. Again it did not work, but the general continued to believe in his good star.
Since the day he managed to land safely in Karachi and snatch power from Nawaz Sharief, Musharraf believes his god is protecting him; that is perhaps why he decided to continue to stretch his luck and play on two tables at the same time. Therefore, on one side, he has become the best ally of the US [which has lifted all sanctions against him] and on the other, he continues to be the chief protector of the Qazi Hussain Ahmeds, the Masood Azhars (who master-minded the hijacking of the Indian Airlines plane in December 1999) and so many other so-called freedom fighters. In a Western movie scenario, he could have been the poker player. But does he know that the life of a poker-player, even with an American Colt, is dangerous?
It appears that American intelligence agencies have now found that there were at least four Laden lookalikes moving around in fake convoys from Kandahar to Jalalabad or Kabul to fool their satellites. But are the same agencies aware that there are plenty of other Ladens in the madrassas of Pakistan? That they are as powerful and resourceful as their Kandahar clone? Qazi Hussain Ahmed is one of them, but there are so many others. Maulana Fazlur Rehman, chief of the Jamaat-e-Ulema-i-Islam, declared at a recent meeting in Quetta that more than 44 outfits in the US alone have been involved in terrorist activities. He bragged that no action had ever been taken against them.
In the meantime, one can hope that Secretary of State Colin Powell and National Security Adviser 'Condo' Rice, who themselves are from a minority community, will have more sensitivity and will be able to advise the president that 'enough is enough', as the emotional chief minister of Jammu & Kashmir told the assembly after the cruel bomb attack on the Srinagar legislature building. He added, "If the US could not wait for a day after Black Tuesday, are not 12 years too much for testing our patience?" Later, he requested the Indian government to wage a war on Pakistan to dismantle the training camps there and root out all 'terrorism'.
If the US president's advisers can explain to George Bush the situation as it is in this region, there is no reason why, with determined political and economic pressure, a war cannot be avoided. It is true that the problem perhaps lies in the West having too many economic interests interlinked with certain Arab countries, which are today defending Pakistan in the fear of becoming US targets themselves.
What is needed from the US president is courage and some sacrifice, at least economic. If he really decides to eradicate 'terrorism' [and not only 'selected terrorism'], it should not be too difficult to cut off the huge financial and other resources [particularly arm supplies] to all terrorist groups, starting with the ones based in Pakistan.
Some sacrifice will be required; economic sacrifice, with perhaps a risk of further recession. But it can certainly be done and without human loss. Today, it is in the long-term interests of the US and its allies to go deep into the issue, find out the sources of financing and arming of these terrorist outfits and cut off the flow of their resources.
And perhaps, as Colonel (retd) Anil Athale titled one of his books, there will be a chance to 'let the Jhelum smile again'.
While reading the qazi's interview, something else came to mind: "Why is this happening to Kashmir?" I could not find an answer, but I suddenly remembered that when I had been looking for a cover for my book on Tibet where I had wanted to show the close cultural links between India and the Roof of the World, I came across some of the most exquisite paintings discovered by the great scholar Tucci in western Tibet. These frescoes of bodhisattvas, very similar in style to the cave paintings of Ajanta, had been painted by Kashmiri artistes who had fled to Tibet after the invasion of their state in the 11th and 12th centuries.
For centuries and centuries, Kashmir has been a land of culture, of beauty, for many a paradise upon earth. Is it impossible to hope that one day this multifaceted culture will flourish again?

New Exhibition Shows the History of Independent Tibet

I am happy that the exhibition is being used.


New Exhibition Shows the History of Independent Tibet
The Tibet Post International
 03 May 2011
Cornelius Lundsgaard,
Dharamshala: On May 3rd, 'The Tibet Post International' was invited for the inauguration of a brand new exhibition at the Tibet Museum located at the main Temple of the Dalai Lama in Dharamshala. Set in the modern surroundings of the museum's white chalked walls, frosted glass partitions and high ceilings, the exhibition, called "Glimpses of the History of Tibet", was launched by Kalon Kesang Y Takla, Kalon for the Department of Information & International Relations of the Central Tibetan Administration, who ceremoniously scissored a green ribbon and held a short welcome speech.
"We have been receiving many many requests from Tibetan communities and different Tibetan settlements asking for some kind of exhibition which reflects the past history of Tibet" she said and continued, "in the past the museum has been displaying mostly the activities of the different communities and our approach for non-violence and autonomy through non-violent means. Now we have here the history of Tibet, reflecting (...) what was Tibet before".
"Glimpses of the History of Tibet" is the brainchild of renowned expert on Tibet, Claude Arpi, whose effort to document the country's history seems integral to the exhibition. Consisting of 25 segments, the exhibition ambitiously attempts to provide the visitor with a comprehensive understanding of the history of Tibet, from the geological formation of the Tibetan Plateau to the present day occupation of Tibet by Communist China. "We have been very pleased that he kindly presented a set for us to have here at the museum" said Kalon Kesang Y Takla, commenting on Arpi's work.
The exhibition in many ways stands in stark contrast to the official Chinese version of the history of Tibet with numerous items on display indicating a Tibetan sovereignty stretching back many centuries. With reference to artefacts pre-dating Chinese rule, such as Tibetan stamps, passports and banknotes, Kalon Kesang Y Takla said that "according to international historical recognition, Tibet qualified as an independent state before 1959" and added that "this may in some ways contradict what china has been saying about the Tibetan situation, [but] the history speaks for itself, nobody can change [it]. So that is the fact, we just reflect it in this exhibition".
"Glimpses of the History of Tibet" will be exhibited at the Tibet Museum for a month, after which it will be taken to various schools and Tibetan communities around India. "Given time and other resources we would love to have this travel abroad so that non-Tibetans, and especially young Tibetans who were born abroad, will be reintroduced to the rich legacy of the history" said Information Secretary, Thupten Samphel of the Department of Information & International Relations of the Central Tibetan Administration.
Speaking of the scope of the exhibition he continued to say that "it is very comprehensive and in the same time it captures the important periods of Tibetan history in a nutshell" adding that "for Tibetans as well as non-Tibetans who are interested in the history of Tibet, it is a very powerful way to introduce them to the Tibetan people's past".

The making of the Pakistani bomb and the US dichotomy

A couple of month back, I published an article The making of the Pakistani bomb in The Indian Defence Review.
It proved the eternal ambiguity (or dichotomy) of the US policy vis-à-vis Pakistan.
Quoting from an official US document, I wrote in conclusion that the Pakistani bomb was built with US 'support': "[During the 1980s], the US was criticized for providing massive levels of aid to Pakistan, its military ally, despite laws barring assistance to any country that imported certain technology related to nuclear weapons. President Ronald Reagan waived the legislation, arguing that cutting off aid would harm US national interests."
Undoubtedly, there is a long love/hate story (at least since 1947) between the United States and Pakistan.
The US 'made' Bin Laden (just read The Bin Laden Files, a set of fascinating historical documents in the National Security Archives) and then spent billions of dollars trying to track him in Pakistan, the US 'ally' against terrorism.
Yesterday, The New York Times elaborated on the US past of Bin Laden:

Through the looking glass of Sept. 11, it seemed ironic that the Americans and Osama bin Laden had fought on the same side against the Soviets in Afghanistan — as if the Americans had somehow created the Bin Laden monster by providing arms and cash to the Arabs. The complex at Tora Bora where Qaeda members hid had been created with the help of the C.I.A. as a base for the Afghans fighting the Soviets.
Bin Laden himself described the fight in Afghanistan this way: “There I received volunteers who came from the Saudi kingdom and from all over the Arab and Muslim countries. I set up my first camp where these volunteers were trained by Pakistani and American officers. The weapons were supplied by the Americans, the money by the Saudis.”
In truth, the Americans did not deal directly with Bin Laden; they worked through the middlemen of the Pakistani intelligence service.

The same ISI has been hiding Bin Laden for the past ten years in Pakistan, while proclaiming that he was dead.
Is this entire story not strange?
My conclusion is that the successive US Administrations have wasted the American tax payers' money for decades in betting on the wrong horse.

Where has Confucius gone?

My article Where has Confucius gone? appeared in The Statesman in Kolkata. Click on the title to read.

The Symbol and the Protector of the Nation

(I have updated an earlier post on the new Kalon Tripa)

Ballots have spoken: Dr Lobsang Sangay, born in India 43 years ago and educated at Harvard Law School will be Kalon Tripa (Prime Minister of Tibet’s government-in-exile) for the next 5 years.
Already a couple of weeks before the results were officially announced by the Chief Election Commissioner, rumors were circulating that Sangay had gathered 27,000 votes in his tally, against 18,000 for Tenzin Namgyal Tethong, his nearest rival and 3,000 for the experienced Tashi Wangdi..
The fact that the rumors were accurate shows that the Tibetan ‘democracy’ remains still young and shaky. Some solid home work needs to be done by the Tibetan institutions in exile, if they want to project the image of a vibrant democracy.
After the results, Sangay asserted: "It is sobering to realize that nearly 50,000 people in over 30 countries voted in the recent Kalon Tripa and Chitue elections”; for an outside observer, it is rather surprising that only 58% of the voters participated in such crucial election. If one compares with the recent Legislative Assembly elections in Tamil Nadu and other Indian states where 80% of the registered voters went to the polls, the Kalon Tripa election saw a relatively low participation, especially considering that some 1,20,000 Tibetans are illegible to vote.

Beijing must have also known the results: already on March 22 (two days after the elections were held), an editorial of The People’s Daily complained: “In 1992, Lobsang Sangay rose to fame and became the youngest leading member of Tibetan Youth Congress (TYC), a terrorist organization in nature.”
The Tibetan youth organization was thus described: “The crimes made the organization look like a kin member of Al-Qaida, Chechnyan armed terrorists and ‘East Turkistan’ separatists.”
Even more far-fetched, the Communist mouthpiece’s affirmed: “The organization also made preliminary plans to prepare personnel, funding and arms to steal into China through the China-Nepal border.”
The paranoid Chinese State, which locks up behind bars whoever does not have the same views as the Communist Party (the latest on the list are Nobel Laureate Lui Xiaobo and artist Ai Weiwei), likes also to malign its opponents abroad.
For Beijing, Sangay’s crime is to have been, like thousands of other young Tibetans, a member of the Youth Congress several years ago. Just because the youth organization does not adhere to the Dalai Lama’s Middle Path and believes in a more radical, although non-violent approach, the TYC has been labeled ‘terrorists’.
The main difficulty for Sangay comes from that fact that on March 10, the Dalai Lama dropped a bombshell: he had decided to retire.
In an interview in 2006, the Dalai Lama had already told us:
"I have three commitments: promotion of human values, promotion of religious harmony and promotion of awareness of the Tibetan cause."
He had further elaborated: "Out of three commitments, number one and two are mostly on volunteer basis. Till my death I committed myself to these causes. Regarding the third one (Tibet), in a way it not a voluntary commitment, it is due to past history and to the Dalai Lama institution. I am bound to this commitment and this responsibility, because I am the Dalai Lama who played a role in the past history of Tibet”.
The Dalai Lama had acknowledged his historical role as the Protector and Symbol of the Tibetan Nation, but had already said that he wished to ‘retire’. In his 2011 Tibetan Uprising Day’ Statement, the Tibetan leader explained again the background of his decision: "As early as the 1960s, I have repeatedly stressed that Tibetans need a leader, elected freely by the Tibetan people, to whom I can devolve power. Now, we have clearly reached the time to put this into effect.”
In June 1991, the Tibetan Parliament in exile (also known as the Assembly of Tibetan People's Deputies) had adopted a ‘Charter’, a sort of Constitution guaranteeing all Tibetans equality before the law without discrimination on the basis of sex, religion, race, language and social origin. While providing a separation of power between the judiciary, legislature and executive powers in the Central Tibetan Administration (or Government in exile), the Charter assigns specific functions to the Dalai Lama as the Head of the State.
With the recent announcement, the Assembly has no choice but to amend the Charter as the Tibetan leader’s functions will have to be allotted to other bodies or individuals. It is a difficult task, though the Dalai Lama said: "It is to benefit Tibetans in the long run. It is not because I feel disheartened. Tibetans have placed such faith and trust in me."

The new context
The elections were held in a specific context, just 10 days after the Dalai Lama’s announcement, not giving time for the electors to ‘digest’ the enormity of the news; most voters still believed that the Kalon Tripa was to function under the leadership of the Dalai Lama. Today, Sangay, the new Tibetan leader faces a different job description. Had the Dalai Lama’s decision been communicated earlier; it would have put the stakes of the elections in a different perspective.
Now, it will not be an easy task for Sangay to ‘replace’ the Dalai Lama. Many Tibetans in Dharamsala (mainly the older generation) are doubtful. Youth who elected the good-looking and articulate Sangay believe that he can breathe a new life into exile politics. Only the future will be able to see if they are right.
A serious legal hurdle remains, the amendment of the Charter.
A five member 'Constitutional Amendment Drafting Committee' was asked to suggest a legal solution to the tricky situation.

The Proposal
The Drafting Committee has chosen the Middle Path, keeping in mind both aspects of the issue: the past historical role of the Dalai Lamas and his personal status vis-a-vis the Tibet Nation as well as his request to be relieved of all day-to-day responsibilities.
Having completed its job, the Committee will present the outcome of its deliberations to a National General Meeting scheduled to be held at Dharamsala from May 21 to 23. This enlarged consultative group comprises of a few hundred ‘senior’ Tibetans such as ‘former ‘prime ministers’, members of the Cabinet, former ministers, present and former members of Parliament, officials above joint secretary rank, representatives from the local assemblies of Tibetan settlements and eminent members of the civil society.
The 'draft' which will later need to be ratified by the Assembly, gives the legal background and the dual role of the Dalai Lama: “The Charter provided that the successive Dalai Lamas shall exercise their responsibilities as head of the Tibetan nation and as chief executive of the Tibetan administration.”
However, “in deference to His Holiness the Dalai Lama's irrevocable decision to relinquish his administrative and political roles and in the face of His Holiness' rejection of pleas to reconsider that decision”, the Assembly should adopt the necessary amendments to separate the Dalai Lama’s two roles and take care of his recent request, while safeguarding the continuity of the Central Tibetan Administration as the legitimate governing body of the Tibetans in exile.
The proposal is as follows: “His Holiness the Dalai Lama fully vests the Central Tibetan Administration and in particular its democratic leadership organs with the powers and responsibilities formerly held jointly by His Holiness the Dalai Lama and the Central Tibetan Administration to represent and serve the whole people of Tibet.”
However, a Preamble is added to the Charter in the same way as the US Constitution is amended, by adding amendments rather than by incorporating the amendments into the body of the Constitution as in India.
In a way, it is a legal Middle Path solution which should satisfy all the parties involved, except Beijing perhaps.
In Article 1, the Dalai Lama is termed as the ‘Protector and the Symbol of the Tibetan Nation’: “[as] human manifestation of Avaloketeshvara, is the guardian and protector of the Tibetan nation. He is the guide illuminating the path, the supreme leader, the symbol of the Tibetan identity and unity, and the voice of the whole Tibetan people. His authority is derived from centuries old history and heritage and, above all, from the will of the people in whom sovereignty is vested and therefore comprises the following inherent rights and responsibilities.”
Though freed from day-to-day official functions, the Dalai Lama would continue: “To provide advice and encouragement with respect to the protection and promotion of the physical, spiritual, ethical and cultural well being of the Tibetan people, to remain engaged in the efforts to reach a satisfactory solution to the question of Tibet and to accomplish the cherished goals of the Tibetan people.”
Apart from being the Protector, the Dalai Lama will also be a mentor and an advisor. This formulation takes care of one of the major legal hurdles. In any system of governance, a head of the State is required (he/she can be an elected leader in the case of a Republic, a King/Queen in a monarchy or a religious leader in a theocracy), but there can’t be a constitutional vacuum.
The elected Prime Minister (such as Lobsang Sangay now), is only the executive head of the Administration, not the Head of the State.
The Dalai Lama could continue to provide guidance in various forms “in matters of importance to the Tibetan people, including the community and its institutions in exile”, either on his own or at the request of the Administration.
The Dalai Lama could also be requested to continue to meet with world leaders and other important individuals and bodies to speak on behalf of the Tibetan people.
This clever formulation takes care of several serious issues.
For example the Government in exile in Dharamsala is known as the ‘Central Tibetan Administration of HH the Dalai Lama’, his embassies in Delhi and abroad are ‘The Office of the Representatives of HH the Dalai Lama’, the officials conducting the talks with Beijing are the ‘Envoys of HH the Dalai Lama’, etc., the proposal of the Drafting Committee should solve these issues, as the above institutions should be able to retain their respective names.
Vis-à-vis the Government of India who has a Liaison Office (Ministry of External Affairs) in Dharamsala, this should answer their queries, if any.
It solves also the problem of ‘succession’ as all the executive powers will be concentrated on the elected Prime Minister. Where then is the question of a successor taking over the Dalai Lama’s responsibilities?
Regarding the relations with Beijing, it is more difficult. But it is perhaps because the situation has not moved for the past 30 years and that the future seems rather bleak that the Dalai Lama has decided to withdraw at this point in time.
The Chinese have repeatedly said: “The Central Government will never discuss the future of Tibet with the Dalai Lama. What we can discuss with him is his [own] future and that of some of his supporters.”
The Dalai Lama has always stated that he was not bothered by his status, but was only interested in the welfare of the 6 million Tibetans in Tibet.
The present radical changes will not alter the respective positions of Beijing and Dharamsala. Unless something drastic happens within China, for example a movement à la Tunisian, nothing much can be expected on the negotiation front.
In any case, Sangay won’t have an easy job; he will need the support of all his countrymen. It is probably why in his first message after the election, he appealed to the Tibetans: “The time has come for all Tibetans to take on greater responsibility. While I will do my utmost to fulfill the responsibility you have placed in me, the success of the next Kashag will depend on the engagement of all Tibetans. Together, I am confident we will march together towards a better future.”
Let us hope that the Tibetans will remain united in these difficult times.

Chinese Cyber Weakness

The Kaspersky Security Lab Service has just published a fascinating interview about China's cyber security. 
A friend commented: "I'm not surprised that China is vulnerable, this is yet another example of why security is asymmetric in nature. It several orders of magnitude of effort to plug *all* the holes (defense effort) as opposed to the effort required to find *one* hole (attack effort).
So this 'new' finding that might 'surprise US policymakers and Pentagon officials' is rather odd, I don't think it would surprise anyone in the security community assuming the broadest possible definition of security community."
In the previous Chinese White Paper on Defense, the concept of Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA) comes up again and again, so is the idea of ‘active defensive’. 
Practically it means a military strategy in which China does not initiate wars, but engages in war to defend its national sovereignty and territorial integrity: “Strategically, it adheres to the principle of featuring defensive operations, self-defense and striking and getting the better of the enemy only after the enemy has started an attack,” says the WP which also introduces the notion of ‘RMA with Chinese characteristics’.
The WP gives the history of the concept: “Entering the 1990s, the PLA began to vigorously promote RMA with Chinese characteristics. It established the military strategic guideline of active defense for the new era, based on winning local wars in conditions of modern technology, particularly high technology. It began to adopt a strategy of strengthening the military by means of science and technology, and a three-step development strategy in modernizing national defense and the armed forces, and promoted the coordinated development of national defense and economy.”
This gives us an idea of the general direction in which the PLA wants to go in the years to come, but nothing very specific is mentioned.
In the cyber world, the best defense is attack, this is 'active defense'.
The Chinese hackers will probably continue to attack target abroad, however it remains that the Chinese servers are unsecured. 
Beijing will have to tackle this issue in the years to come, if it does not want to face serious drawbacks. 

Glass Dragon: China's Cyber Offense Obscures Woeful Defense
April 27, 2011
Paul Roberts
The official line in Washington D.C. is that there's a new Cold War brewing, with an ascendant China in the place of the old Soviet Union, and cyberspace as the new theater of war. But work done by an independent security researcher suggests that the Chinese government is woefully unprepared to fend off cyber attacks on its own infrastructure.
For the last 18 months, Dillon Beresford, a security researcher with testing firm NSS Labs and divorced father of one, has spent up to seven hours a day of his spare time crawling the networks of China's state and provincial governments, as well as stealthier networks belonging to the PLA and the country's top universities. Armed with free tools like Metasploit and Netcat, as well as Google Translate, he's pulled back the curtains on the state of cyber security in China. What he's discovered may come as a surprise to many U.S. policymakers and Pentagon officials.
Contrary to the image of China as a nearly invincible cyber powerhouse, Beresford says in an interview with Threatpost Editor Paul Roberts, that the fast-growing nation suffers from woeful cyber security practices at home that leave, literally, thousands of networks and databases vulnerable to even trivial, remote attacks. Beresford, who publicized holes in domestic Chinese SCADA systems in September, 2010, said the country's aggressive cyber offense abroad, he said, is in stark contrast to an almost total lack of basic cyber defense at home that has left both classified and unclassified government networks vulnerable to attack and compromise. That should give the Chinese government pause as it ponders the consequences of a global campaign of cyber espionage, and create an opportunity for the U.S. and China to de-escalate what he sees as a growing cyber arms race. Beresford has publicized holes in recent weeks highlighting insecure mail servers and databases he has uncovered. He spoke to Roberts on April 26th, 2011.

Threatpost: Why China? What got you looking at the vulnerability of China's networks?
Dillon Beresford: The best answer to that question is 'curiosity.' I was reading a lot about cyber war  and the capabilities of PRC and PLA. I was hearing a lot about the vulnerability of U.S. critical infrastructure, so I got interested in China and wanted to find out about its infrastructure - map out the flashpoints.

Threatpost: You suggest that China's single party system is actually to blame for some of the poor security practices you discovered. Can you explain?

Dillon Beresford: One of the things I thought about with my research is the issue of transparency. This is an issue in China and, I would guess, other authoritarian regimes. A lot of what is running in China is developed in-house by Chinese firms.  They're not using Western products or open source platforms, because they don't trust them or they're worried that someone might put a back door into them. The down side is that they don't benefit from the whole community of people who are crawling over those platforms and patching bugs and looking for holes.
In China, you see that not a lot of government and private sites are interconnected, as they are in the U.S. That kind of interdependence allows there to be lots of eyes looking at the same network and make it more likely that mistakes will get discovered and reported. But, in China, the government runs everything and there's no clear policy for cyber security.
In Chinese culture, also, its hard to publicly come out and admit mistakes - a fear that people will lose faith in their abilities. So, for example, a journalist who is writing on this got an email from an official in the Office of Foreign Affairs who was worried about losing his job.

Threatpost: It's interesting, because the picture you paint is so different from the one that's presented in the media.
Dillon Beresford: Yes. The media hype in the U.S. is all about cyberwar  and how the Chinese are kicking our ass. I wanted to know how vulnerable are the Chinese, and what I found is that they are just as vulnerable as the U.s. if not more-so. In large part, I think its because of this lack of transparency and openness. I'm hoping that, as a result of my work, they might realize this and maybe tone down their aggressiveness towards U.S. After all, we have the best people and it won't be long before other researchers will do as I have.

Threatpost: Why haven't other security researchers looked at this before you?

Dillon Beresford: I think the language barrier has discouraged people, but with Google's translation tools, that really isn't an issue any more.

Threatpost: How have you managed to navigate these networks and sites?

Dillon Beresford: Rosetta Stone. I've been studying Chinese for a year now, so its getting easier. And I work with people from China, which helps. 

Threatpost: How do you choose your targets?

Dillon Beresford: Its really not hard. In fact, the amount of data I have found that is not intended for public consumption is amazing. I stopped after three terabytes. These systems are not maintained  and are all vulnerable to attacks. HTTP is just one attack vector, but there are many others. For example: there was an LDAP server that was accessible from the Internet and it running a vulnerable version of PHP and, in addition, everything on the server was running as root. I find that a lot - its a bit of laziness by system administrators that makes their job easier. I was able to compromise the the server and then simply enumerate the directory and find other file servers and systems on the network that weren't connected to the Internet. Another example is China's National University of Defense Technology. They had a bunch of Web servers that weren't using SSL or HTTPS, so everyone was logging in using plain HTTP. All you needed to do was compromise one box and you could sniff all the user names and passwords in clear text.

Threatpost: What kinds of vulnerabilities are you finding commonly?

Dillon Beresford: As I mentioned to you before, vulnerable VxWorks installations are very common. I see a lot of Huawei integrated access devices in the private sector there as well, and they all run VxWorks. When Cisco went to vxworks so did Huawei, and they're just out there listening and waiting for a connection, and they haven't been patched or they've got weak passwords that you can brute force. You can just fire up Metasploit and find the vulnerable vxworks installations.  Once you have one vulnerable system, say a switch or router, its very easy to pivot from that to other devices.
I've found lots of appliances - routers, firewalls, IPS. A lot of them have back doors left by the developers. If I find it, I can generally exploit it and get into it. A lot of these devices have Web interfaces that have remote command execution vulnerabilities that allow you to use a function call, say, to log into the device without authenticating. If you have NetCat, you can just fire it up and connect directly to the box. And these publicly exploitable devices are so important, because they're potentially connected to other parts of the network that are even more vulnerable, because it was assumed that they're not public. So, if you find a Web server that's connected to a private LAN (local area network) and the Internet, you can compromise it, then reach out and compromise ever other box on that network.

Threatpost: You've found lots of evidence of weak authentication and passwords, as well?

Dillon Beresford: Yes. I'd estimate that 40% of logins are user name and either all numerical or all lowercase passwords. There are no hash or space characters. They're not complex and there are weak access controls - controls that aren't properly implemented, or there's no password requirement or two factor authentication, which is becoming increasingly common in the West. You don't see any of that in China.

Threatpost: As you talk to officials in China, what sense do you get about the reasons for the widespread problems with insecure IT infrastructure?

Dillon Beresford: I think China is growing very fast and there aren't enough people to maintain the infrastructure. They have more networks and government sites than their own government can even maintain. They don't have the manpower or even the knowledge to maintain them. And, in many ways, China is still playing catch up with the US. They're an aggressor in cyberspace, but their own networks are very weak and poorly designed. I'm not saying that to shed a negative light on China, but there's so much out there that they just can't maintain it all. Beyond that, there's a lack of trust in Western products - even open source products. A fear that people will put back doors in them, which really misunderstands what open source is about, which is: if we have a lot of eyes looking at the code, people will spot problems and fix them.

Threatpost: Have there been any "whoa!" moments where you've come across a hole or exposed data that really surprises you?

Dillon Beresford: That moment was probably the National Institute of Defense Technologies. I mean, when you think about it, they have supercomputers there that they use for cryptography. What's funny is that, if you look, you can't find a Web site for the Ministry of State Security or the Ministry of Cryptography, but most of the projects that the government allocates money for those agencies goes to universities. Its the students who create spy tools, so if you want to find the classified information, you just have to go to the University networks and get it.
Its the same with the People's Liberation Army. Their networks are hidden all throughout China and they're hard to find. But if you can find a vulnerable file server, you can pivot and proxy into a network that may be their equivalent of SIPRNet (the United States' classified information network). Students can make VPN connections into PLA networks. I've seen the client. You have students and cadets who attend university then, when they graduate, go to work for the PLA. In the meantime there's a lot of traffic going between the PLA and the universities.

Threatpost: What do you want to accomplish with this research?

Dillon Beresford: I've been transparent about this research and reported everything to China CERT. I want to create awareness of the problem and raise the bar. I'd like there to be open communications between the U.S. and China. We have to sit down at the same table. If other researchers like myself publish vulnerabilities maybe china will think twice about attacking U.S. companies and acknowledge that they have problems and weaknesses as well.

Where is Confucius gone?

“China is the developing country with the strongest potential, but is still lagging behind the US, the EU and Japan in terms of soft power, including the maturity of economy, technology, education and culture. [China] is an important Asian player with global interests and impact, but is still unable to take a leadership role in the region. [China] is a socialist country with unique governing and value systems, but is experiencing deep reforms and awaiting territorial unification as well as threatened by national separatism and social unrest.”
Thus spoke Wang Jisi, the Dean of the School of International Studies in Beijing University, also a member of President Hu Jintao’s personal think tank. Wang’s message was clear: China will continue to stick to a ‘peaceful rise’. Wang, who expressed himself in the very official Global Times, even disapproved of some Chinese analysts who, in 2010, made provocative statements extending China's ‘core interests’ to the South China Sea.
Soon after Dr Manmohan Singh returned from his trip to the island of Hainan (to attend the Third Summit of BRICS nations,) Willy Lam, the veteran China watcher wrote in East-Asia-Intel.com: “Call it damage-control diplomacy. Since President Hu Jintao's American visit in January, Chinese diplomats and ‘official’ academics have been trying to reassure the world of Beijing's non-aggressive, ‘peaceful development’ diplomatic posture.”
The Indian press also noted a thaw and immediately rejoiced about the renewed possibility of the recurrent friendship between India and China.
But there is another side to the ‘peaceful’ coin.
When the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Liu Xiaobo, (he had initiated the Charter 08 which calls for the introduction of democratic reforms in China) Beijing went wild. It enraged Beijing so much that a Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson described the award as 'obscene'.
Though Lui’s demands were rather mild, he was jailed for daring to speak about ‘reforms’.
Since February, when the Arab world began to ask for ‘reforms’, Beijing started trembling. The regime became nervous. Already in late January, an article entitled Major Social Unrest Every Five Days in 2010 appeared, quoting a report published by the Shanghai Jiao Tong University on social unrest in China. It affirmed that in 2010, there has been a major incident of social unrest in the Middle Kingdom every five days. This represented a 20% increase over 2009. While 60 major incidents of social unrest were reported in 2009, it climbed to 72 in 2010: “Social unrest had spread throughout 29 provinces and cities (over 90%), with most occurring in Henan, Beijing, and Guangdong.”
The unexpected upheavals in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya did not amuse the leadership in Beijing. According to The People’s Daily, in February Wu Banguo, a member of the all-powerful Standing Committee Politburo of the CCP stated: “Based on China's national conditions, [we] solemnly declare that we will not engage in a multi-party political system or in diversity of the guiding ideology. We will not pursue the ‘separation of powers’ and the bicameral system, or engage in federalism or privatization of property.”
Beijing's response was extremely tough when an online campaign called for weekly rallies all around China. The Sydney Morning Herald reported that during one of these rallies: “Hundreds of uniformed and plainclothes police smothered Beijing's designated rally site on the Wangfujing shopping street, aggressively pushing away foreign reporters with cameras and briefly detaining several.”
Soon after meeting, Zhou Yongkang, the member in charge of national and public security confirmed that a national database containing basic information on the different strata of the population would soon be set up. He also announced that an early warning system will be put in place to alert the authorities in case of social grievances to diffuse possible incidents before they happen.
Then Ai Weiwei was arrested. The artist-activist is famous in China for having worked as the artistic consultant for the Beijing National Stadium for the 2008 Olympics. His mistake was probably to have questioned the government on corruption, particularly about the construction of Sichuan schools which collapsed during the 2008 Sichuan earthquake.
In China, many had thought that Weiwei was ‘untouchable’. But even when several foreign governments and human rights groups called for the artist's release, Beijing officials did not move, except to say that he was accused of ‘economic crimes’.
Nicholas Bequelin who works for Human Rights Watch believes that his arrest was calculated to send the message that no one would be immune, in Chinese terms, ‘you kill the chicken to scare the monkey’.
The green light for the operation probably came from the top leadership. The Guardian analyzed: “Chinese authorities have made their biggest move against dissidents and activists for years, including artist Ai Weiwei. The crackdown followed an anonymous online call for protests inspired by Middle Eastern uprisings, although it is unclear if any of those held or missing were connected to the appeal.”
We are far from the ‘peaceful rise’ trumpeted by Wang Jisi and other academics.
Wei Jingsheng, the exiled ‘father’ of the democratic movement in China commented: “ Since this happened to one of China's most well-known cultural figures, it has prompted many to remember the opening shots of the Cultural Revolution, when the Maoist regime removed ideologically inconvenient artists, writers and intellectuals from the scene at will without even any pretense to legal procedures”.
More ironically, a 31 foot-high statue of Confucius erected three months earlier with great pomp in front of the National Museum (formerly The Museum of the Revolution, but the word ‘revolution is taboo in China today) near the famous portrait of Mao on Tiananmen Square, was suddenly removed on April 22.
Where did the statue mysteriously go? Nobody seems to know. But as Wei Jingsheng wrote: “no one in China is safe from the whims and anxieties of those [officials] in power”. Not even Confucius, said a commentator.
Even more brutal.
On 16 March 2011, the self-immolation of Phuntsok, a Tibetan monk belonging to Ngaba Kirti Monastery in Sichuan province triggered violent protests by several thousand monks in Eastern Tibet.

According to the Tibetan Center for Human Rights and Democracy: “Chinese security forces have cordoned the monastery and additional contingents of armed security forces (estimated to be around 800) have been brought in on 9 April 2011 to reinforce security clampdown in Ngaba County. The movement of the monks is totally restricted with no one being allowed to go in or come out of the monastery.”
Since then, more depressing news have circulated, particularly the increased presence of Chinese security forces in all Tibetan areas of Sichuan, Gansu and Yunnan.
According to other information, Chinese Communist cadres are roaming around villages “and talking about harmony and patriotism”.
After some 300 monks of Kirti monastery were trucked away by Chinese police to an unknown destination on April 21, some Tibetan prefectures of Eastern Tibet have been closed to foreign tourists. The latest reports affirm that the situation is extremely tense in the entire region.
The present leaders in Beijing may be less corrupt than the Qaddafis or the Mubaraks, but the repression of the ordinary people's aspirations is the same in China, in Libya or in Tunisia. Of course, the West is too scared of China and will not intervene or even condem the happenings there, but ultimately Beijing’s attitude does not lead to stability and peace and its recognition as a responsible power.