PREPARATION AND LAUNCHING OF A WORLDWIDE CAMPAIGN FOR THE FREEDOM OF TIBET - SATYAGRAHA 1998

A first draft program of discussion

1) Goals of the Satyagraha

a) Final goal: the opening of negotiations between China and Tibet.

b) Intermediate goals: to obtain requests by national governments and international organizations for the opening of negotiations (by singling out the nature of documents: parliamentary resolutions, statements, etc); other intermediate goals.

c) Possibility to stop the Satyagraha. Definition of defeat and success.

2) The (Satyagraha) Movement

a) Outside Tibet

Singling out the geographical areas where to start the campaign. Methods of political action (dialogue, nonviolence).

What initiatives: large-scale collective fasts; hunger strikes for particular goals; actions of civil disobedience and resistance; strikes and massive demonstrations; pickets in front of the seats of national governments and international organizations; boycotts and other.

The pressure on the economic community.

How to spread the initial involvement by the Tibet Support Groups and the Radical Party to other political, social, economic, cultural and religious groups. The role of Chinese dissidents inside and outside China (ways of keeping in touch and coordination).

b) Inside Tibet

Limits and risks. What initiatives, and when ? The present situation in Tibet. Demonstrations, massive arrests, actions with great results on the media; involvement of parliamentarians and other personalities. The role of Tibetans resident in Tibet.

c) Role of the United Nations and other international organizations. The UN Security Council and Secretary General. Astrategy of action for a different approach. The old-fashioned principle of self-determination of peoples. The international legal sources useful to achieve the principle of right and duty to nonviolent interference.

d) How to launch the Movement: singling out the date and the places for the actions to be carried out at first.