I was intrigued and excited when an invitation recently dropped on my mat inviting me to a do at Joanna Lumley’s house to raise awareness for the continuing human rights abuses in Tibet.

In 1959 the Chinese invaded Tibet, murdering 1.2 million of its citizens and for the past 47 years has subjected the remainder to a brutal repressive regime.  
 
Maddeningly our government vaguely tuts yet continues to suck up to China.  Ironically the UK is not usually so shy to hold back when human rights are apparently at stake. Since 1959 we have been involved in military action in over 17 countries*, in most cases human rights having been a much touted excuse for military action and it’s outrageous we haven’t yet come to Tibet’s aid.
 
Tibet would probably have dropped even further off the world’s radar by now without Hollywood’s support.  People may sneer at celebrities using their position to draw attention to world wide atrocities – Richard Gear caused outrage for making anti China comments during the 1993 Oscars - but in the case of Tibet thank goodness they do.
 
Joanna introduced Namdrol Lhamo and Gyaltsen Drolkar, 2 Tibetan nuns who after a peaceful protest were tortured and locked up in the notorious Drapchi prison in Lhasa for 12 years.  Although they relayed their stories dispassionately and quietly there was no escape from the horror of the regime from which they had escaped.  
But there are glimmers of hope.  The Beijing Olympics in 2008 is shining the international spotlight on Tibet and the world is now making its feelings clear.  Let’s hope this has some effect on the Chinese government. 
The continuing destruction of Tibetan culture is heartbreaking.  During a recent television programme Michael Palin visited the Potala Palace and I winced as he cheerfully interviewed a brainwashed Tibetan about life in the brave new Tibet.  
 
`The Chinese are wonderful to us’, smiled the stepford Tibetan but you could see the bleakness behind his eyes and imagine the Chinese mandarins pulling his strings as he spoke.
 
In 2002 I lived in Kathmandu where many Tibetans now live in exile. Here one gets a glimpse of the Tibetan spirit and culture, so brutally suppressed in their native land.  From there I took a bus to Dharamsala, in Northern India, staying in Richard Gear’s hotel – in his very own bright red room – but not actually with him I hasten to add (regretfully).
 
Dharamsala village is scruffy, crowded, the streams were full of rubbish because there is no proper sanitation or rubbish collection, there are shortages of water and sometimes of food, and there were power cuts every night.  Yet it is vibrant, safe, colourful and extraordinary, the Tibetans I met yearned for home yet cheerfully and industriously got on with the business of living.  
 
Some disaffected nations turn to suicide bombing and terrorist atrocities while the Tibetans just soldier on peaceably.  But where does it get them?  In the west the Dalai Lama inspires vague spiritual feelings but this doesn’t translate into much useful action.   The `spiritual but not religious’ camp offer woolly support with endless round robin emails and `spiritual’ quizzes in his name - nonsense like; `this comes from the Dalai Lama.  If you send it to 10 people you will receive boundless good fortune’ etc.  
 
Do the man a real favour, delete his purported emails and support Tibet instead.  Check out www.tibet-house-trust.co.uk for details. 

……..
 
*
Since 1959 the UK has invaded and/or been involved in military action (sometimes just covertly supporting the US) in the following countries;
 
Bosnia and Herzegovina
The Falklands
Iraq
Kosovo
Kuwait
Afghanistan
Croatia
Sierra Leone
Kuwait
AND Jordan, Vietnam, North Yemen, Indonesia, Chagos islands, Nicaragua, Libya, Panama.

 
 
FULL DETAILS

1958 July: Britain conducts military intervention in Jordan, ostensibly to protect regime from alleged Egyptian-backed coup. Declassified documents suggest, however, that British planners fabricated the coup scenario to justify intervention.
1961 Death of UN Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold in mysterious plane crash while trying to secure peace in Congo. Recent evidence has emerged of possible MI5 involvement.
1961 US begins major intervention in Vietnam. As US atrocities mount in the war that follows, Britain secretly provides US with military intelligence, arms and covert SAS deployments, along with diplomatic support.
1961 July: Britain conducts military intervention in Kuwait, ostensibly to defend the country from imminent Iraqi invasion. Declassified documents suggest, however, that British planners fabricated the threat to justify intervention.
1962 MI6 and SAS begin covert operation in North Yemen that eventually involves providing arms, funding and logistical support to royalist rebels in dirty war against pro-Egyptian republican forces. Around 200,000 die in the war.
1964 Britain begins second war in support of Oman regime, against the Popular Front for the Liberation of the Occupied Arabian Gulf, fought mainly covertly by the SAS. The ‘Dhofar Rebellion’ is defeated by 1975.
1965 October: Bloodbath in Indonesia begins as army moves against supporters of Indonesian Communist Party, reaching around a million deaths. Declassified documents show Britain aids the Indonesian army in conducting the slaughter through covert operations and secret messages of support.
1968 Britain begins illegal and secret removal of 1,500 population of Chagos islands, including Diego Garcia, following agreement to lease islands to US. Whitehall conspiracy begins, contending there are no indigenous inhabitants.
1970 July: British coup in Oman overthrows Sultan and installs his son. Sultan Qaboos remains in power today.
1975 December: Indonesia invades East Timor, leading to 200,000 deaths. In secret cable, British ambassador in Jakarta says Indonesia ‘should absorb the territory as soon and as unobtrusively as possible’ and that Britain ‘should avoid taking sides against the Indonesian government’.
1980 MI6 begins largest postwar covert operation in Afghanistan to train mojahidin groups fighting the Soviet occupation.
1981 US begins covert intervention against Nicaragua, training contra rebels in sabotage and terrorist operations. Britain provides strong diplomatic support to US and nod and wink to ‘security’ company, KMS, to train and recruit contra guerillas and conduct gun-running operations.
1983 October: US invades Grenada. British government privately furious at US failure to consult in invasion of Commonwealth country, but publicly backs intervention.
1985 First contract with Saudi Arabia signed in massive Al Yamamah arms deal. With second deal in 1988, overall worth is around £50 billion.
1986 Spring: MI6 begins supplying Afghan mojahidin groups with ‘Blowpipe’ shoulder-launched missiles, some of which are used to shoot down passenger airliners.
1986 April: US conducts air raids on Libya. Britain allows US use of British air bases and provides strong public support.
1989 December: US invades Panama. Britain is only major state to unstintingly support US.
1991 January: US, Britain and coalition begin massive bombing campaign against Iraq to force withdrawal from Kuwait following its invasion the previous August.
1991 April: Britain and US establish ‘no fly zones’ in northern and southern Iraq. They begin covert, permanent war of bombing in the zones.
1991 November: Indonesian forces massacre hundreds of peaceful demonstrators in Dili, East Timor. Britain continues arms exports and business as usual.
1992 MI6 draws up plans to assassinate Yugoslav president Milosevic, according to an MI6 official. These plans are apparently not carried out.
1993 June: US conducts cruise missile attacks against Iraq. Britain provides political support.
1994 April: Rwanda genocide begins, quickly killing a million people. Britain effectively aids the slaughter by helping to reduce UN force that could have prevented the killings, in helping to delay other plans for intervention and in resisting use of the term ‘genocide’ which would have obligated the international community to act.
1996 MoD quietly sends first of several training teams to assist Saudi Arabia in ‘internal security’ as part of wider support to Saudi Arabian National Guard, the force that protects the ruling family.
1996 February: Assassination and coup attempt against Libya’s Colonel Qadafi with, according to former MI5 officer David Shayler, MI6 funds and backing.
1996 April: British-supplied Scorpion light tanks used in Indonesia to repress demonstrators. It is the first of eight known occasions in 1996–2000 that British armoured cars are used for internal repression. Blair government continues arms to Indonesia.
1996 September: US conducts cruise missile attacks against Iraq. Britain provides political support.
1997 February: Labour leader Tony Blair reassures BAE Systems, Britain’s largest arms company, that ‘winning exports is vital to the long term success of Britain’s defence industry’.
1998 August: US launches cruise missile attacks against Al Qaida training camps in Afghanistan and a pharmaceutical factory in Sudan. Britain provides strong political support.
1998 December: US and Britain begin four-day heavy bombing campaign against Iraq, followed by weeks-long secret escalation of bombing in ‘no fly zones’.
1999 March: Britain and NATO begin bombing campaign against Milosevic’s Yugoslavia over Kosovo. The humanitarian catastrophe that Western leaders claim they are preventing is in reality precipitated by NATO bombing.
1999 April: Former members of Kenyan Mau Mau movement announce they are suing British government for human rights atrocities committed in 1950s.
1999 August/September: Around 5,000 are killed in East Timor and 500,000 forced to flee from Indonesian-backed terror around the vote for independence. Britain continues arms sales to Jakarta and finally agrees only to delay not stop them, while inviting Indonesia to an arms fair in Britain. Blair government tries to take credit for stopping Indonesian violence by helping to establish UN peace enforcement mission.
1999 October: Chinese premier Jiang Zemin visits Britain. Blair government refuses to raise human rights issues publicly, while police deny protesters the right to peaceful assembly and illegally seize Tibetan flags.
2000 January: Chinese defence minister, General Chi Haotian, who commanded the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, visits Britain to explore ‘military cooperation’, showing London’s apparent defiance of EU arms embargo on China.
2000 February: As Russian forces ferociously bomb the Chechnyan capital, Grozny, reducing the city to rubble, Foreign Secretary Robin Cook says he ‘understood’ Russia’s problems in Chechnya.
2000 July: British national Ian Henderson resigns as adviser to Bahraini government after career as head of repressive internal security service.
2000 November: High Court rules against government that Chagos islanders be allowed to return to some of their homeland islands, but not Diego Garcia.
2001 British arms exports reach £5 billion for 2001.
2001 February: US/British airstrikes against Iraq in response to alleged threats to aircraft in ‘no fly zones’.
2001 August: US and Britain secretly step up bombing campaign in ‘no fly zones’ in Iraq.
2001 October: US and Britain begin massive bombing campaign against Al Qaida and Taliban regime in Afghanistan following terrorist attacks of September 11th. Civilian deaths in the war outnumber those killed on September 11th.
2001 November: At the World Trade Organisation summit in Qatar, Britain with EU allies tries to force ‘new issues’ on to the WTO’s negotiating agenda in face of opposition from developing countries. The latter remain united and the decision is delayed for two years.
2002 Foreign Office website continues to lie that there are ‘no indigenous inhabitants’ of the Chagos islands, while Foreign Office continues in effect to block islanders’ return.
2002 August: With full-scale war against Iraq appearing imminent, US and Britain secretly step up bombing campaign in ‘no fly zones’.
2002 October: In midst of continuing Russian atrocities in Chechnya, Tony Blair says ‘it is important to understand the Russian perspective’.
2003 March: After months of build-up, US and Britain launch war against Iraq, discarding the UN weapons inspection process and bypassing the UN Security Council.