March 19, 2008
Tourists speak of shock and fear at Tibet riots
Jeremy Page in Kathmandu
Western tourists emerging from Tibet yesterday described their shock
and fear as they watched a "howling" mob of Tibetans stoning and
beating Chinese passers-by in two days of rioting in Lhasa last week.
They said that the crowd turned on anyone and anything that looked
Chinese, knocking over motorcyclists, hitting them with metal rods and
setting fire to their motorcycles.
Their testimony illustrated the ferocity of the riots, which have
undermined not only China's claims to have brought peace and
prosperity to Tibet but also the Dalai Lama's longstanding creed of
non-violent resistance.
"It's hard to pick a side in what happened," said John Kenwood, a 19-
year-old backpacker from Canada who flew into Kathmandu, the Nepalese
capital, yesterday after spending ten days in Lhasa.
"I agree that the Tibetans have their own culture, but I can't agree
with what people did. After a while, it was not about Tibetan freedom
any more."
He said that he was walking along Beijing East Road in the Tibetan
quarter in Lhasa when he saw four Chinese military trucks pull up at
the intersection with an alley leading to the Ramoche temple.
Mr Kenwood said that he saw someone throw a large stone at one of the
trucks, smashing its windscreen, and then about 30-40 paramilitary
police armed with riot shields and batons jumping out of another
truck.
They blocked off the entrance to the alleyway, but were soon
surrounded by a large crowd of Tibetans who began pelting them with
stones, he said. He also said that he saw three boxes of stones but it
was not clear who had provided them.
After a few minutes two or three of the younger Tibetans rushed at the
Chinese police and they fled down the alleyway towards the Ramoche
temple, he said. The crowd followed but soon turned back and began
attacking Chinese shops and passers-by on Beijing East Road.
He said that he saw at least five Chinese people being attacked by the
crowd, including a motorcyclist in his 20s who he thought was beaten
to death. "They got him in the head with a large piece of sidewalk,"
he said. "He was down on the ground and he was not moving."
Mr Kenwood added that he spent the weekend confined to the Yak Hotel
on Beijing East Road, from where he heard gunfire and teargas
canisters and saw armoured personnel carriers moving through the
streets.
As he left Lhasa yesterday most schools, shops and other businesses
had reopened and Tibetans and Chinese were moving around the city, he
said. He added that there were very few young Tibetans on the streets
after the midnight deadline on Monday for rioters to surrender.
"The Tibetans weren't smiling any more," he said. "There were soldiers
everywhere. I saw some older Tibetan ladies but there were fewer young
guys wandering around."
Claude Balsiger, a 25-year-old backpacker from Switzerland who arrived
in Lhasa on March 8 and flew to Kathmandu yesterday gave a similar
account of the violence. He described seeing the mob beating an old
Chinese man on a bicycle. "They were howling like wolves," he said.
"That's the point when it went insane. They started attacking anything
and anyone that looked Chinese."
He also described seeing a Canadian tourist step in to rescue a young
Chinese man being attacked by the crowd. "They were kicking him in the
ribs and he was bleeding from the face," he said. "But then a white
man walked up ... helped him up from the ground. There was a crowd of
Tibetans holding stones. He held the Chinese man close, waved his hand
at the crowd and they let him lead the man to safety."
Mr Balsiger said that Lhasa was very tense and locals were reporting
as many as 100 people dead and 1,000 arrested as he left the city on
Monday to spend the night at an airport hotel.
He said that there were military checkpoints every 10-15 metres,
manned by young Chinese soldiers with bayonets fixed on their rifles.
"They were really young and nervous. They always had their finger on
the trigger - that's what made us really nervous."
Stephen Thompson, 41, from New Zealand, said that he arrived at the
Saikang Hotel just as the riot was starting and saw the mob smash the
glass front of the building. "We didn't feel in danger but some people
in the group were pretty emotional and one person was injured by a
rock that hit them on the head," he said.
Martin Camps, 55, from Germany, said that he had arrived with his wife
on the train from Beijing on Friday, only to be told that he could not
leave his hotel and that all attractions were shut. Hotel staff then
told him to leave on Sunday, when he was driven to the airport hotel.
"I think without China it would be much better there," he said.
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