A recent Q&A with Tibet’s top official revealed that the The Chinese Communist Party was seeking
to “severely punish” those who don’t share the government’s “beliefs and ideals”.
Although this message is nothing new for the repressive Chinese government, the threat
was particularly directed at followers of the Dalai Lama.
Tensions between China and the religious figure have long been the primary source of conflict
in the Tibetan region.
So we wanted to know: just why does China hate the Dalai Lama?
Well, their main problem is that Tibet currently stands as an autonomous region of China.
This effectively means that it has some form of self-rule, but is ultimately under China’s
suzerainty [sue-zur-un-tee].
In 1965, their communist government officially established this dependency, having forced
Tibetan leaders to sign away the country’s independence in exchange for guaranteed autonomy.
But in the years since, this relationship has proven incredibly tricky.
Tibetans view themselves as culturally distinct from China, having developed their own society
over thousands of years.
Even their language is more closely related to that of neighboring Myanmar than it is
to China.
As a result, Tibet has long demanded full independence.
The current Dalai Lama, according to Tibetan Buddhist beliefs, is the 14th incarnation
of the region’s spiritual and political leader.
As such, he is considered to represent the Tibetan Independence movement.
This is despite the fact that he himself has rejected the idea of full independence, and
has simply advocated for greater self-autonomy.
Unfortunately, his ideas and massive following have not been taken lightly by China.
In 1959, he was forced into exile in India just a few years after the Chinese occupation
of Tibet.
The Dalai Lama’s pro-independence following is a massive problem for China, which sees
any deviation from government plans as disastrous.
This situation is all the more complicated by the Dalai Lama’s religious influence.
Although China’s constitution does guarantee religious freedom, their track record on the
topic has been fraught with human rights abuses.
Just last year, numerous muslim ethnic minorities living in another autonomous region were arrested
and oppressed due to their beliefs.
Unsurprisingly, one of the tenets of China’s Communist Party is atheism.
The Dalai Lama also represents an east versus west divide, which has come to color many
of China’s anti-US sentiments.
Much of the western world supports the Dalai Lama, who has met with multiple US presidents,
and was even awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989.
Clearly, China hates the Dalai Lama because he threatens what China sees as their rightful
control over Tibet.
Meanwhile, Tibet’s population has used the exiled spiritual leader as the face of their
independence movement.
In China’s eyes, squashing the Dalai Lama and his followers would end the movement.
In fact, the PRC has claimed that ALL Tibetan independence movements are actually Western
backed imperialism attempting to destroy China.
It seems unlikely that either side is willing to compromise, and we may just see continued
government oppression.
Tibet is not China’s only autonomous region.
Find out more about the others in our video.
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