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Lawmaker wants Dalai
Lama visit
By Loa Iok-sin / Staff reporter
Taiwan Solidarity Union Legislator Lin Shih-chia (ªL¥@¹Å) yesterday said she would
propose officially inviting Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama to deliver a
speech at the Legislative Yuan.
¡§To show that we¡¦re in solidarity with the Tibetans in their quest for freedom,
I will make a proposal to formally invite the Dalai Lama to deliver a speech at
our legislature,¡¨ Lin said during a question-and-answer session after the
Tibetan government-in-exile¡¦s Minister for Information and International
Relations Dicki Chhoyang made a presentation at the Legislative Yuan on the
exiled government, its policies and issues facing Tibetans inside and outside
Tibet.
The event was co-hosted by Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Hsiao Bi-khim
(¿½¬üµ^) and the Tibetan Religious Foundation of His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
Lin¡¦s proposal triggered a round of applause from the audience.
She said she would begin to collect signatures from fellow legislators and
hopefully submit the proposal during a plenary session in the next legislative
session.
Dicki Chhoyang is in Taiwan on her first stop of a tour to exiled Tibetan
communities. Her tour will also include stops in South Korea and Japan.
In her speech, the Tibetan minister stressed that the government-in-exile would
stand firmly behind the principles of non-violence and the middle-way approach
in solving the Tibet issue.
Dicki Chhoyang also criticized the Chinese government for what she said was
Beijing laying blame on the Dalai Lama and the government-in-exile for
anti-Chinese sentiment and interethnic conflict in China.
¡§It [the conflicts] is often rooted in misguided, not well-structured,
policies,¡¨ she said. ¡§First, the patriotic re-education campaigns imposed on
monasteries, resettlement of nomads and the language policy.¡¨
Dicki Chhoyang said that in its propaganda campaigns, the Chinese government
stations troops in monasteries and asks monks to denounce the Dalai Lama, while
trying to destroy the centuries-old way of life of Tibetan nomads by forcing
them to resettle in collective communities.
On language policy, the Chinese government has made Mandarin the medium of
instruction in schools and only offers a few hours of Tibetan-language classes ¡X
taught in Chinese ¡X per week, she added.
¡§A lot of Chinese in mainland [sic] China have no access to information other
than what¡¦s been given by the government,¡¨ Dicki Chhoyang said. ¡§We really would
like to request Chinese communities in free societies to deliver the accurate
information.¡¨
Hsiao said that while both Taiwan and Tibet are facing threats from China, ¡§the
suffering of Tibetans is much more serious than the Taiwanese.¡¨
¡§It saddens me to see Tibetans trying to speak out through extreme actions, such
as self-immolation, because they cannot take it anymore,¡¨ Hsiao said.
¡§We should all show more concern to human rights conditions in Tibet,¡¨ Hsiao
said.
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