Pelosi urges world to condemn China over crackdown
Nancy Pelosi has called on the world community to condemn China for the way it has crushed protests in Tibet, saying that the issue was a challenge for the "conscience of the world".
Nancy Pelosi, who leads the Democratic party in Congress, was the first foreign politician to meet the Dalai Lama since the bloody unrest spread across the roof of the world. Her appearance alongside the Tibetan spiritual leader at his home in the north Indian town of Dharamshala was condemned by Beijing, which accused her of meddling in China's internal affairs.
Pelosi's visit and strong language are the most serious breach in a western consensus that China's economic and strategic strength renders impossible any protest beyond verbal expressions of unease.
She did not call for an Olympic boycott, which the Dalai Lama has also opposed, but appeared to open the door to one if China maintained its crackdown in Tibet. She said the "world is watching" events there, and called for an international investigation into the violence, and access to the region for journalists and international human rights monitors.
Pelosi said it was incumbent on "freedom-loving people throughout the world" to speak out against China's "oppression". If they did not, "we have lost all moral authority to speak on behalf of human rights anywhere in the world".
With China so keen to have it's Olympics go well, there really has never been a better time to put pressure on the regime regarding Tibet.
George Bush has made it very clear that he intends to attend the opening of the Olympics and that he will not reconsider this. However, John McCain is speaking forcefully about this:
Yesterday, John McCain drew attention to Bush's caution on the subject, saying that Tibet was "one of the first things I would talk about if I were president of the United States today".
"The people there are being subjected to mistreatment that is not acceptable with the conduct of a world power, which China is," McCain said.
McCain does well to speak in this way, and he's certainly being more pro-active than Prime Minster Brown has been. The UK are anxious to maintain good relations with the world's latest emerging super power and have been largely silent on the issue of Tibet. Both McCain and Pelosi are to be applauded for having the courage to speak out when so many of their political counter parts are maintaining a diplomatic silence.
I understand that there is almost no chance of a boycott of the Olympics, or even of the opening ceremony, however at a time when the world's spotlight is on China, and at a time when China is so keen to be perceived in a good light, Pelosi and McCain are doing well to put pressure on the regime, to remind the Chinese that we can all see what they are doing and that - as a banner unfurled in Rome recently stated - "We are all Tibetans now".
Nor is it only western governments which are being slow to condemn the Chinese crackdown in Tibet:
The Chinese versions of the US-based websites MSN and Yahoo! have published a list of names and photographs of 24 Tibetans accused by the Chinese authorities of involvement in protests in Lhasa. The grainy pictures are apparently taken from video footage shot during the unrest. "It beggars belief that Yahoo! is acting as China's right-hand man in its brutal crackdown on Tibetan protesters," said Matt Whitticase, from the Free Tibet Campaign. "Yahoo! knows very well that these protesters will have no access to legal representation and that either execution or long prison sentences and torture awaits any protester arrested in Lhasa."Pelosi and McCain may only have warm words to offer the Tibetans comfort, but that is a vast improvement on the silent complicity being offered by western governments.
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