Tibetologists say Dalai Lama´s anniversary speech distorts facts

Source: Xinhua | 03-27-2009 11:13

BEIJING, March 26 (Xinhua) -- The 14th Dalai Lama has distorted facts in his public remarks this month, say Chinese tibetologists.

In his speech on the March 10 anniversary of the "uprising" five decades ago, the Dalai Lama said today's Tibetans "literally experienced hell on earth", and only the old Tibet was "a free Tibet".

Tibetologists said Thursday his remarks were neither in accord with the facts nor with the feelings of the Chinese people, including Tibetans.

WHOSE "SHANGRILA" WAS OLD TIBET?

Although some people claimed ordinary Tibetan people were well fed before 1959, American tibetologist A. Tom Grunfeld said after he conducted a 1940 survey in eastern Tibet that "there is no evidence to support the picture of Tibet as a Utopian Shangrila".

The survey found 38 percent of Tibetan families never had tea to drink, 51 percent could not afford butter and 75 percent sometimes had to eat weeds boiled with ox bones and oats or bean flour.

In contrast, in 1959, the Dalai Lama alone owned 160,000 liang (8,000 kilograms) of gold, 95 million liang of silver, over 20,000items of jewelry and jade, and more than 10,000 pieces of silk and satin fabric and rare fur clothing, while his family possessed 27 manors, 30 pastures and more than 6,000 serfs, according to Zhang Yun, a researcher with the China Tibetology Research Center.