China arrests suspects in Tibetan riots

By TINI TRAN, Associated Press Writer 

BEIJING – China lashed out at the Dalai Lama on Monday, accusing him of being a hypocrite who has deceived the west about his political agenda as authorities announced they had detained suspects in four deadly arson cases in Tibet.

Jiang Zaiping, the vice chief of the Public Security Bureau in the Tibetan capital of Lhasa, said investigators have taken into custody suspects responsible for arson attacks on three shops — including a clothing outlet where five young women were burned to death — and one in nearby Dagze county, the Tibet Daily newspaper reported Monday.

The fires killed a total of 12 people, state media has reported.

Authorities have taken 414 suspects into custody in connection with the anti-government riots, Jiang was quoted as saying. Another 298 people have turned themselves in, he said.

The Tibetan regional government also announced that the families of two of the women killed were given compensation of $28,170, the official Xinhua News Agency said.

It did not say how many suspects were involved in the four arson cases or give any other details.

An official who answered the telephone at the Lhasa Public Security Bureau said no senior officials were available to give details. He refused to give his name. It was unclear how many suspects had been directly involved in the four arson cases.

Read the rest:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080331/ap_on_re_as/china_tibet_247

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China’s True Face

 The Host of the Olympics or the Thug of Tibet?

By Wei Jingsheng
The Washington Post
Wednesday, March 19, 2008; Page A15 
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As what the Dalai Lama has called “cultural genocide” goes on in Tibet, it is wholly unacceptable that Jacques Rogge, the head of the International Olympic Committee, refuses to take a stand against the Beijing government’s current crackdown on Tibetan protesters. In fact, this is completely at odds with the “spirit of the Olympics.”

Chinese riot police march through the city of Kangding, located around 400 kilometres (250 miles) west of Chengdu in Sichuan Province March 17, 2008. Chinese officials declared a “people’s war” of security and propaganda against support for the Dalai Lama in Tibet after the worst unrest in the region for two decades racked the regional capital Lhasa over the past few days, killing at least 10 people. The convulsion of Tibetan anger at the Chinese presence in the region came after days of peaceful protests by monks and was a sharp blow to Beijing’s preparations for the Olympic Games in August, when China wants to showcase prosperity and unity.
REUTERS/David Gray (CHINA) 

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Far more than Steven Spielberg, who quit his advisory role for the Summer Games because of China‘s unwillingness to pressure the Sudanese government on genocide in Darfur, the IOC has a special obligation to act. Since promised improvements in China’s human rights were a quid pro quo for awarding the Games to Beijing, how can it proceed as if nothing happened when blood is flowing in the streets of Lhasa?
  
Above: Steven Spielberg, seen in 2006, cut his ties with the Beijing Olympics. The director, while working for China, came to believe that China is not doing enough to help end the conflict in Darfur. (Associated Press photo).And if the Dalai Lama resigns from all his public positions in response to the violence, as he said yesterday that he might, the prospect of resolving the Tibet issue peacefully will be even more hopeless. We will feel very sorry if that comes about — for Tibet and for China.

If the IOC doesn’t move to put pressure on Beijing consistent with its obligations, it risks this Olympics being remembered like the 1936 Games in Berlin. Already, the spirit of the Olympics in Beijing has become associated with the word “genocide,” thanks to Spielberg and the Dalai Lama. Indeed, if the IOC and the rest of the world do not pressure Beijing to stop the crackdown and improve human rights now, a boycott of the Games will widely be seen as justified.

Read the rest:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/18/AR2008031802596.html?hpid=opinionsbox1

Peace and Freedom wishes to thank  Wei Jingsheng  who we consider a special friend.

The writer, a recipient of the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award, lives in exile in Washington. He was first arrested in China in 1979 for his activities with the “Democracy Wall” movement and was released in 1993 nine days before the International Olympic Committee voted on Beijing’s bid for the 2000 Games. He was arrested in March 1994 for “plotting against the state” and released in 1997.

China ‘will spare no efforts’ to ensure Olympics safe

BEIJING (AFP) – China will spare no effort to ensure a safe Olympics, the foreign ministry said Tuesday, after officials said two alleged terrorist plots from its Muslim-majority northwest had been thwarted.

Muslim delegates from China’s northwestern region of Xinjiang stand on Tiananmen Square after attending a meeting in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on March 10. China’s warnings of a series of sinister Tibetan and Muslim threats could be part of a campaign to silence all manner of dissent ahead of the Olympics, rights groups and activists say.(AFP/Peter Parks)

“I’d like to stress that China is relatively safe, but we will not be careless,” foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang told reporters.

“We will spare no efforts and continue to do a good job in ensuring security during the Olympics. We are confident and competent to ensure that.”

Wang Lequan, Communist Party chief in the northwestern Xinjiang region, said Sunday that a January raid on “terrorists,” which resulted in the deaths of two militants and 15 arrests, had foiled a planned attack on thethe August Games.

Read the rest:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080311/sp_wl_afp/
chinaattacksoly2008xinjiang_080311101737

Arrests made in Chinese spying cases

By LARA JAKES JORDAN, Associated Press Writer 

WASHINGTON – A Defense Department analyst and a former engineer for Boeing Co. were accused Monday in separate spy cases with helping deliver military secrets to the Chinese government, the Justice Department said.

Additionally, two immigrants from China and Taiwan accused of working with the defense analyst were arrested after an FBI raid Monday morning on a New Orleans home where one of them lived.

The two cases — based in Alexandria, Va., and Los Angeles — have no connection, and investigators said it was merely a coincidence that charges would be brought against both on the same day.

The arrests mark China’s latest attempts to gain top secret information about U.S. military….

Read the rest:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080212/ap_on_
go_ca_st_pe/chinese_spies;_ylt=AqQ2DwgA8C59cJJJgMELX72s0NUE

Saudi Arabia Arrests 28 “Deviated” Men

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — Saudi Arabian police have arrested 28 men for allegedly planning to attack holy sites around Mecca and Medina during the recently finished Muslim hajj pilgrimage, the kingdom’s Interior Ministry said Sunday.

The announcement comes two days after the ministry said it arrested an unknown number of men after security forces foiled a plot to carry out a terror attack on holy sites outside Mecca. But Sunday’s statement did not say whether the two were arrests were related.

The ministry said 27 of the men were Saudi nationals and one was a foreign resident.

”Thanks to God, the security forces managed to detain members of the deviated group who have links with elements outside (the kingdom) while planning to carry out criminal acts inside,” a statement by the Interior Ministry statement said.

Saudi authorities often use the term deviated group to describe terror suspects linked to al-Qaida.

Nearly 3 million pilgrims came to Saudi Arabia for the annual hajj ….

Read the rest:

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Saudi-Arabia-Arrests.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

In the Heart of Pakistan, a Deep Sense of Anxiety

By Emily Wax
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, November 7, 2007; Page A01

LAHORE, Pakistan, Nov. 6 — Three days after President Pervez Musharraf declared emergency rule, a deep sense of anxiety prevails among Pakistan’s students, rights activists and intellectuals, who say the mass arrests being carried out by the government mark an unprecedented assault on civil society.

When Musharraf suspended the constitution Saturday, he said he had been forced to act by rising extremism and judicial interference in his efforts to protect the country. But in Lahore, an ancient city that has long served as the cultural and intellectual heart of Pakistan, many government critics see a smoke screen being used to quash opposition.

Read the rest:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/06/AR2007110600516.html?hpid=topnews

Protests, Arrests in Vietnam

To:  The Honorable Brian C. Aggeler
Political Counselor, U.S. Embassy in Hanoi

From: International Movement for Democracy and Human Rights in Vietnam

Re: Report on the police crackdown on 1,700 protesters in front of office of Vietnam Congress in Saigon at 10PM July 18, 07.

Dear Mr. Aggeler,

At 10PM July 18, 07 Saigon time, the police dispatched over 1,500 male and female police equipped with electric prods, police trucks, animal control trucks and vans, etc. to disperse the sit-in protest of 1,700+ peasants from 19 different provinces who had gathered in front of the office of Vietnam Congress at 194 Hoang Van Thu Street, Saigon, Vietnam for almost a month.

These following arrested peasants are classified as protest leaders. 4 peasants were knocked down unconscious by police electric prods, 24 peasants were badly injured. 1 young man from Lam Dong province got serious head injury. 8 police ambulance vans full of injured protesters were seen leaving the protest site.

Also on the same night of July 18, 07, over 100 police also arrested 200+ protesters in Binh Thuan, Binh Phuoc and Soc Trang provinces who had been gathering permanently at Mai Xuan Thuong Park in Hanoi. Police have transported them away to unknown places in 2 trains.

These following peasants were arrested on July 18, 07 in front of Vietnam Congress office at 194 Hoang van Thu Street, Saigon, Vietnam:

1- Lu, Thi Thu Duyen, female, 34 years old
2- Vu, Thanh Phuong, female, 40+ years old
3- Pham, Thi Hien, female, 30+ years old
4- Cao, Que Hoa, female, 50+ years old
5- Le, Thi Nguyet, female. 50+ years old

Nguyễn Tr� (Ch�) Dũng, Saigon Police Director announced that he will interrogate Lu, Thi Thu Duyen and Vu, Thanh Phuong for their active roles in (1) leading the sit-in protest, (2) participating in Bloc 8406 which has been founded last year by Nguyen Thanh Phong and Nguyen Binh Thanh and under Father Thaddeus Nguyen Van Ly�s spiritual guidance. These two men and Father Ly are being imprisoned.

Currently, we are not able to account for all other arrested peasants. We will provide you with further information as soon as possible. Thank you.

Respectfully yours,
International Movement for Democracy and Human Rights in Vietnam