Published by: World Tibet Network News Friday, September 19, 1997

by H. Asher Bolande

BEIJING, Sept 17 (AFP) - Chinese officials on Wednesday sharply defended their hard line toward separatism in the restive western regions of Tibet and Xinjiang.

At a media briefing on the sidelines of the 15th Communist Party congress here, the top party leaders from the two regions vowed to impose ethnic and religious harmony at all costs.

Tibetan deputy party secretary Raidi (eds: one name), hailed a "patriotic education" campaign aimed at cleansing separatism from the Himalayan region's monasteries and temples.

The campaign, begun last year, was necessitated by "serious penetration by

separatist cliques led by the Dalai Lama" -- Tibet's exiled spiritual leader, he told a media briefing on the sidelines of the 15th party congress in Beijing.

Some 30,000 of Tibet's 46,000 Buddhist monks and nuns had received the education, he said.

Tibet's party secretary Chen Kuiyuan insisted the crackdown -- which has been the subject of vocal criticism from human rights groups and exiled Tibetans -- had been ordered in response to public demand.

Monastic and religious discipline had previously got "out of control", leading to improper and illegal behaviour by monks and nuns, he said.

"At the instigation of splittist groups abroad, some of them have engaged in activities designed to jeopardise social stability, undermine ethnic unity and split the motherland," Chen said.

Human rights organisations say the "patriotic education" campaign has led to monastery closures, mass arrests and forced detentions.

But Chen said the crackdown was necessary to "establish normal religious order" and to protect "the legitimate rights and interests of believers."

Wang Lequan, the top communist official in the Moslem-dominated northwestern region of Xinjiang, meanwhile said there could be no negotiation or compromise with separatist forces there.

Separatists "pose a direct threat to the supreme interests of the country. There is no room for accomodation," he said.

Referring to ethnic unrest that culminated in February this year with serious rioting in the border town of Yining and three bomb attacks in the regional capital of Urumqi, Wang said: "These incidents were undertaken by a handful of criminals who cannot dominate the social situation in Xinjiang.

"They do not represent the people of Xinjiang ... and are supported by reactionary forces overseas and are social dregs," he added.

The bombings indiscriminately killed innocent people of different ethnic groups, he said, quoting a Chinese saying: "Killers should be killed in kind."

"They are ferocious thugs ... How can we be soft with them?" he added.

He said Xinjiang separatists were motivated by Islamic religious intolerance and a desire to eliminate anyone who does not share their creed.

Xinjiang, which borders onto the Moslem republics of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, has seen the eruption of a fresh bout of anti-Chinese sentiment and terrorist activity in the last two years.

Wang revealed that "seven patriotic officials" were killed by a murderous band of "thugs" on April 29 last year.

"From February 10 onwards, a host of thugs committed a series of murders and sometimes killed three to four people at a time. In the worst incident on April 29, seven patriotic figures were killed," he said.

According to official reports at the time, nine Islamic separatists were killed in a bloody clash with police on the latter date.

Sporadic rebellions in Xinjiang have been put down by Chinese rulers for centuries, except for a short period between 1944 and 1950 when the state of East Turkestan emerged.

Chinese forces took control of Tibet -- which had been ruled by the Dalai Lama's theocratic regime -- in 1951, and the spiritual leader fled the deeply Buddhist region eight years later after a failed anti-Chinese uprising.

The exiled god-king, though still deeply revered within Tibet, is routinely denounced by China as a traitor and separatist.

Beijing keeps both regions under tight control, claiming their ethnically distinct peoples enjoy political autonomy.

"China simply cannot resolve the problem of Xinjiang and Tibet, because those regions have external points of reference, such as separate cultures and history, that are not Han Chinese," a Western scholar said.