Pre-Olympics pressure on the Chinese government is beginning to pay off, with reports that Beijing is willing to meet representatives of the Dalai Lama.
It may be churlish to say, but it is also true: The Chinese are not floating talks because they feel regret over recent events in Tibet, nor because they are willing to entertain the suggestions of the Tibetan government-in-exile.
They are doing so because it throws a bone to other governments growing restless at Beijing’s intransigence and boorishness. An Olympics tournament stained by Chinese misanthropy at home and abroad is inevitable, so, for the Chinese, it’s now all about damage control.
Another example of the symbolic damage that China cannot help inflicting on itself came on Thursday with the latest torch debacle in Canberra.
The thing that made this leg of the relay different was the effort put into mobilizing thousands of sometimes hostile Chinese and Chinese-Australian protesters, whose tactics included verbal and physical assaults on a small number of pro-Tibet protesters. Vivid scenes of violence and jingoism demonstrated that this Olympic Games is headed irrevocably toward symbolic disaster.
Links between the Chinese embassy and the protesters have been alleged by the head of the local government that includes Canberra. This is hardly surprising, because Chinese embassy and consular officials are well known to have informal but proficient systems of surveillance throughout Australia’s Chinese community and civic organizations.
The message to people outside Australia is that the majority of people with Chinese heritage would not support the Chinese ambassador’s defiance toward law enforcement officials over the role of the paramilitary torch guardians, for example, nor the disrespectful behavior of the Chinese protesters.
The message to the Chinese protesters in Canberra, however, should be far less civil. It was not so long ago that Australia gave thousands of Chinese students sanctuary when their government massacred their fellows in the nation’s capital. Now, a generation later, today’s youth from the Central Kingdom — in this case, largely members of the elite — are acting as tools of that same government and (literally, in some cases) spitting in the face of democratic freedoms of their host country.
That so many Chinese and Chinese Australians abused their freedom to protest by turning the occasion into a celebration of intimidation and nationalist bile offers another wake-up call to those romantics who say that engaging China is in itself sufficient to produce a more civilized and open country.
It is one thing to attend a torch relay carrying a flag. It is another thing altogether to receive embassy support and money and carry placards praising the domination of Tibet at an event celebrating world peace.
Unfortunately for China, the damage is long done. All that remains is for Beijing to alienate even its sympathizers in the West as the Games approach.
Meeting with the representatives of the Dalai Lama is simply not enough, and although the prospect of more talks and genuine communication is tantalizing, the reality is that nothing will come of it unless other governments maintain their pressure and teach China, this empire of self-pity, the meaning of accountability.
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