HONG KONG—Chinese authorities in Tibet and the northwestern region ofXinjiang, two of the most politically sensitive ethnic minority regions in thecountry, are tightly controlling who will be allowed to watch the Olympic flamepass on its way to start the Games in Beijing.
The torch relay was originally scheduled to startfrom Lhoka (in Chinese, Shannan) prefecture on Friday and then enter Lhasa,which saw violent rioting and protests against Chinese rule in mid-March, but the initial leg of the torch's progress through the Himalayan region was canceled in favor of a single day event Saturday in Lhasa, sources said.
"All who are to participate in the relay of the Olympic torch will be placed in a hotel," a Tibetan source in Lhasa said.
"Most of the Tibetans selected hold some kind of leadership position. The authorities seem to be very worried about protests," he said, adding that restrictions on Tibetans in Lhasa were very intense.
"During the holy month of April, Lhasa and the surrounding area would normally be bustling with people visiting monasteries and other religious sites and making offerings. This time, they are all being forced to stay home," the Lhasa source said.
Armed police in Lhasa
Tibetans had been threatened with the loss of their jobs and even pensions if they performed the usual offerings during the torch relay, he added.
Travel agencies in Lhasa said thousands of armed police were patrolling the streets of Lhasa ahead of the rally, and that arrangements had been made for people from all work units and schools to travel to show their support.
Detailed routes haven't been publicized in advance but other residents of the Tibetancapital also reported tightened security in the city, where thousands of securityforces were drafted to quell the unrest that spread to other Tibetan regions ofwestern Chinain March.
“Authorities dare not tell people the detailed routes along which the torchrelay will pass in advance,” one Lhasaresident said. “There will also be traffic control.”
Sources said major routes to the Potala Palace, the former homeof the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, would be blocked forthe rally.
“When the torch arrives at the Potala Square in Lhasa,a curfew will be imposed,” one resident said. “All shops and stores will beclosed, and major roads to the Potala Palace will also beblocked.”
Orchestrated crowd
“When the torch arrives in Lhasa, theauthorities will organize it so people can watch from a designated location,but when the relay starts, not just anyone will be able to watch it,” the Lhasa resident said.
Sources in the tourist industry in Tibetsaid the activity was aimed at preventing a repeat of the Tibetanpro-independence protests seen in London, Paris, and San Francisco.
China’s Olympic torch relayhas been disrupted by protests in major cities, largely over Chinese rule in Tibet, where awave of anti-government riots and protests erupted in March, triggering anarmed crackdown.
Patriotic demonstrators have since marched in several Chinese cities to demanda boycott of French goods and targeted French supermarket chain Carrefour,after Tibet protesterswrestled with Chinese athletes, including a woman in a wheelchair, for theOlympic torch in Paris.
Meanwhile, authorities elsewhere in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) werestepping up patriotic re-education campaigns in the wake of protests against Chinese rule in Tibet.
Fear of separatism
An official in the Sangri county government in Lhoka said all officials had beenordered to attend patriotic education classes several times a week until afterthe Olympic Games, hosted this year in Beijing,were over.
Earlier this week, the torch journeyed through Xinjiang, home to millions ofTurkic-speaking, Muslim Uyghurs, one week ahead of the published schedule.
Large-scale traffic restrictions were also in place during the torch rally there. Beijing has said it fearsMuslim separatists may be planning “terrorist activities” around the Olympics,vowing to tighten security in the region, where anti-Beijing sentiment is rife.
“Fifteen major roads in Urumqi have been blockedfor three days, from 7 a.m. until 11 p.m.,” one Urumqi resident said.
“Public buses have to make a detour. Shops and stores along the route of thetorch relay have to be closed,” he added.
A spokesman for the German-based World Uyghur Congress, an exiled group ofUyghurs who favor independence from Chinese rule, said only those who hadpassed a political background check would be allowed into the streets to watchthe torch pass by.
Approved cheering
Onlookers would be require to cheer the torch's progress by shouting “GoChina!,” the spokesman said.
Both Tibetans and Uyghurs have chafed under Beijing’s rule for the last six decades, andChinese authorities have faced persistent accusations of repression and abuse.
Chinese authorities recently closed a Web site aimed at promoting understandingbetween Han Chinese and ethnic Uyghurs following allegations that the site waslinked to foreign “extremists.”
China has waged a campaign over the last decade against what it says areviolent separatists and Islamic extremists who aim to establish an independentstate in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, which shares a border withAfghanistan, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Russia, andMongolia.
After the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States,Beijing tookthe position that Uyghur groups were connected with al-Qaeda and that onegroup, the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), was a “major component ofthe terrorist network headed by Osama bin Laden.” The ETIM has denied thatcharge.
Original reporting in Mandarin by Qiao Long, and by RFA's Tibetan and Cantonese services. Tibetan service director: Jigme Ngapo. Mandarin service director:Jennifer Chou. Cantonese service director: Shiny Li. Translated and written for the Web in English by Luisetta Mudie, Jia Yuan and Karma Dorjee. Edited by Sarah Jackson-Han and Richard Finney.