Dalai Lama slams China over Tibet "suffering"

Dalai Lama slams China over Tibet "suffering"

DHARAMSALA, India (Reuters) - The Dalai Lama said on Tuesday more and more Chinese were beginning to see a problem with Beijing's rule over Tibet, lamenting how the homeland he fled 50 years ago had become a "hell on earth."
Speaking before some 10,000 Tibetans from around the world, the 73-year-old slammed China for bringing "untold suffering and destruction" during a series of repressive and violent campaigns in Tibet since 1959.
"These thrust Tibetans into such depths of suffering and hardship that they literally experienced hell on earth," he said from the main Buddhist temple in Dharamsala, the north Indian hill town where the Tibetan government-in-exile is based.
"The immediate result of these campaigns was the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Tibetans."
China tightened security across ethnic Tibetan areas, aiming to head off potential unrest on the sensitive 50th anniversary of a failed uprising that prompted the Dalai Lama's flight into exile in India.
Monks, who have initiated many Tibetan protests in recent years, told Reuters they were under close surveillance and riot police blocked roads and turned away foreign journalists from parts of Sichuan, Gansu and Qinghai provinces.
Later on Tuesday, the Dalai Lama told a news conference the voice of support for Tibet within China was rising steadily.

Tibetan life 'hell on earth'
(02:22) Report Reuters Video
Mar 10 - The Tibetan spiritual leader says the homeland he fled 50 years ago has become a hell on earth under Chinese rule.
The Dalai Lama has delivered a damning attack on China's policies in Tibet on the anniversary of his flight into exile after a failed uprising exactly half a century ago.
Paul Chapman reports.