Rights abuse allegations in Tibet groundless: Chinese media

Beijing: Accusing the US of being an "active provoker" of Tibetan independence, China's state media today said the West was making "groundless" allegations about human rights violations to sabotage the integrity of China.

"The western countries are always hyping human rights conditions in Tibet. Their accusations are groundless," said an article in the state-run Global Times.

"The Western countries are colluding with some Tibetan radicals to instigate Tibet independence. In recent years, China has been developing rapidly. Concerned about China's rise, the Western countries are colluding with the 14th Dalai Lama, who went into exile in India in 1959, and other radicals to instigate Tibet independence," it said.

"However, the Tibetan separatists are merely chess pieces used by the West to counter China," it claimed.

China this month commemorated the 65th year of its takeover of Tibet and Chinese media has been taking an increasingly tough stance against the US of late. Yesterday, the Chinese media slammed the US for lifting the decades-old arms embargo against Vietnam.

Today, the paper said: "The US is also an active provoker of Tibet independence. Given its huge ideological disparity from China, the White House has been attempting to sabotage the integrity of China for a long time."

"In fact, the so-called Tibet independence movement is an outcome of the imperialist aggression against China. Specifically, the UK attempted to construct a buffer zone to protect its geopolitical interests in India, which was colonised by the UK at that time. To this end, the UK invaded Tibet in the 1860s and at the beginning of the 20th century," it said.

"India, after its independence, attempted to inherit the UK's strategic legacies in the region, and thus followed the UK to intervene in the interior affairs of Tibet," it said.

In 1959, the Dalai Lama fled Tibet to Dharmsala in India.

China officially established the Tibet Autonomous Region in 1965. "Since then Tibet has achieved enormous development," the article said.

Tibet's GDP surged from USD 15 million in the 1950s to over USD 17 billion in 2015 and the article claimed that Tibet has seen "dramatic changes" in economy, politics, social welfare and culture.