China protests US House resolution on Tibet

Nonbinding vote urges Beijing to stop 'repression'

Exiled Tibetan Buddhist nuns participated in a rally in Dharmsala, India, to mark the 50th anniversary of the failed uprising against Chinese rule. (Altaf Qadri/Associated Press)

BEIJING - The Chinese government said yesterday that it had lodged a formal complaint with the Obama administration over a resolution passed by the US House of Representatives urging China to "cease its repression of the Tibetan people" and "to respond to the Dalai Lama's initiatives to find a lasting solution to the Tibetan issue."

Representatives voted, 422-1, in Washington on Wednesday to pass the resolution, which was intended to mark the 50th anniversary of a failed Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule. The resolution is not legally binding.

The Chinese regard the Tibet issue as an internal problem and chafe at foreign support for the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of the Tibetans who lives in exile in India. The Dalai Lama advocates autonomy for Tibet and not independence, although Beijing accuses him of supporting separatism.

"The Chinese government and people are strongly dissatisfied with and resolutely opposed to the approval of a Tibet resolution by the US Congress on Wednesday," Ma Zhaoxu, a Foreign Ministry spokesman, said at a news conference yesterday.

He added that the resolution "makes groundless accusations against China's religious policies" and "rudely intervenes in China's internal affairs."

Ma said China had filed a formal complaint to the US government over the resolution. Xinhua, the state news agency, ran several articles and editorials on its website denouncing the resolution. The editorial said the resolution "disregards the history and reality of the Chinese autonomous region by trying to justify Tibet's dark ages, glorify the treacherous Dalai Lama and baselessly criticize China's religious policy."

The Dalai Lama fled to exile in India as the Chinese military crushed the rebellion in 1959.

On Tuesday, the Dalai Lama, 73, attacked Chinese policies in Tibet, saying China had transformed his homeland into a "hell on Earth." The Chinese government, fearful that an uprising could erupt this month in the Tibetan regions, as one did a year ago, has locked down much of western China in recent weeks with troops and police officers.

The row over the resolution is the second one to emerge between China and the United States this week. On Monday, the Pentagon said it had lodged a formal complaint with Beijing because five Chinese ships had harassed an American surveillance vessel in international waters off the southern coast of China.

The Chinese maintain that the American vessel, the Impeccable, had illegally crossed into the waters.

The naval spat and tensions over Tibet occurred as Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi of China is meeting with American leaders in Washington this week.

He met with President Obama yesterday.