ON CHINA'S BUBBLING CAULDRONS

BUILDING PRESSURES

With a picture that brings back memories of Tiananmen Square in 1989, the New York Times outlines how Chinese Forces have "secured" Lhasa, the capital of Tibet:

"Thousands of Buddhist monks and other Tibetans clashed with the riot police in a second Chinese city on Saturday, while the authorities said they had regained control of the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, a day after a rampaging mob ransacked shops and set fire to cars and storefronts in a deadly riot...

The Chinese authorities denied that they had fired on protesters there, but Tibetan leaders in India told news agencies on Saturday that they had confirmed that 30 Tibetans had died and that they had unconfirmed reports that put the number at more than 100."

The piece goes on to outline the full scope of the protests and it's aftermath, including the overseas reactions:

" China’s response to this week’s demonstrations is being watched carefully by the outside world. The European Union and the United States have both called on China to act with restraint.

The White House called on China to “respect Tibetan culture” and issued a renewed call for dialogue between Beijing and the Dalai Lama, the exiled spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism."

The root causes of this protest will likely take a long time to resolve just as the forces that drove the Tiananmen protests in 1989, are still percolating under the surface in China and have yet to be resolved. 

The rest of the world needs to continue to pay attention to both latent problems, both through and beyond the upcoming 2008 Olympics in China.