In Asian media this week: Dangerous turn adds new anti-Beijing flashpoint.
The US, likely supported by India, is preparing to play the “Tibet card” – to add another Asian crisis point to its confrontation with China, along with Taiwan, the South China Sea and islands claimed by Japan and China.
One of the signs that the US intends to raise the temperature on Tibet was a recent visit to India by a Congressional delegation that included Nancy Pelosi, now with the title of Speaker Emerita.
The group met the Dalai Lama in the northern town of Dharamsala, seat of his government-in-exile. Pelosi was allowed to address the Tibetan parliament-in-exile.
The Indian Express reported Pelosi piled praise on the Dalai Lama, speaking of his knowledge, tradition, compassion, purity of soul and love. But she dismissed the notion that China’s President, Xi Jinping, would leave a legacy.
Ravi Velloor, a senior columnist with Singapore’s The Straits Times, noted this week in a detailed analytical piece the trip followed the passage by Congress of a Bill on Tibet that pressed China to engage the Dalai Lama without preconditions and rejected Beijing’s claim that Tibet had been part of China since ancient times. The Bill is awaiting President Joe Biden’s signature.
Velloor said that while in New Delhi the delegation met Prime Minister Narendra Modi and External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar. The group also had a meeting with US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and the administration’s top Asia hand, Kurt Campbell.
“These things do not happen by accident,” Velloor said. “The rest of us must recognise the developments for what they are: a disturbing and potentially dangerous new turn that adds the Tibet border to other Asian flashpoints.”
America was trying to get India into a tighter strategic embrace against China, he wrote. “New Delhi appears increasingly receptive.”
India, he said, might be getting ready to drop its resistance to turning the Quad – the US, Japan, India and Australia – into more of a security partnership.
South China Morning Post reported that China issued a stern warning after the delegation arrived in Dharamsala, vowing “resolute measures” if the US failed to stick by its commitment to recognise Tibet as part of China.
It said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lin Jian had called the Dalai Lama a political exile engaged in anti-China separatist activities.
Lin said China urged the US to have no contact with the Dalai Lama. Specifically, he warned Biden not to sign the recently passed Tibet Bill.
Lin used the Chinese name Xizang – the pinyin, or Chinese romanisation, of the Mandarin script for Tibet.
In a separate story, the Post said Beijing’s use of Xizang was a way to show its sovereignty over the region.
The story quoted La Xianjia, a senior religious studies official, as asserting Beijing’s right to identify the reincarnation of the Dalai Lama, who is expected to announce his own decision in a year’s time.