‘Tibet Libre!’: Protesters March on the Eiffel Tower

By Kasia Anderson

PARIS—France’s Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner may still be questioning whether French athletes should show up at this summer’s Olympic opening ceremony in Beijing, but a throng of pro-Tibet protesters in Paris on Friday clearly had their own answer. Some 300 people rallied for Tibet at the Trocadéro as tensions with China continued to build, hoisting signs reading “Boycott the Beijing Olympics” and “China Out of Tibet” before marching through heavily trafficked tourist zones near the Eiffel Tower. 

“Today’s rally is to fight against the oppression of Tibetans by the Chinese,” said one Vietnamese demonstrator, who preferred to remain anonymous. “China cannot do anything they want in Tibet. They need the support of foreign governments,” she said, stressing that the violent clashes in Lhasa and neighboring provinces don’t just represent a problem for Tibetans; rather, “it’s a global issue.”

Friday’s march on the Eiffel Tower was organized by a group of Tibetans living in France, according to Jampal Chosang, representative for the Dalai Lama in Western Europe. Watching the demonstration from the sidelines, Chosang played down the significance of the potential Olympic boycott and called the Parisian protest “a normal thing,” noting that it was a local and spontaneous show of support. “We are not concerned about the Olympics,” he said. “It’s a side issue.”

Instead, Chosang focused on how, as he put it, the Chinese are “killing innocent people.” Referring to the Internet, he said, “the Chinese show a one-sided account. ... They show only what Tibetans are doing, not what [the Chinese] are doing,” claiming that Chinese troops have “killed 99 protesters” since last week.

Addressing reports that the Dalai Lama somehow instigated this recent spate of violence, the Vietnamese demonstrator, who came with a group of monks from France’s Khanh Anh Pagoda, insisted that the exiled Tibetan leader has endorsed a policy of nonviolence for many years. “Tibetans are against the Chinese, and sometimes they rise up. It’s normal, because they are oppressed,” she said as the gathered group began its march.

Watch a slide show of the demonstration below:

Truthdig / Peter Scheer

Demonstrators gather at Paris’ Trocadéro on Friday to rally for Tibetan independence from China.