2nd April: A government-appointed commission slammed Denmark’s Foreign Ministry this week for caving into Chinese pressure and prohibiting anti-Beijing protests during state visits in 2012 and 2013. According to the Tibet Commission, Denmark’s intelligence and security services used coercion to persuade Copenhagen police to put an end to any anti-China protests, in contravention of the country’s constitution.
Protesters were not allowed to assemble in front of the Chinese representatives. Tibetan flags were confiscated by the police, who hid them beneath buses. Following an “unofficial” meeting between then-Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen and the Dalai Lama in 2009, China canceled numerous official visits to Denmark. The canceled trips prompted Copenhagen to seek China-friendly measures, according to the commission.
The Dalai Lama’s visit to Denmark in 2011 to give lectures on management and the meaning of life demonstrated this. The visit’s organizers made it clear that no political gatherings would be held during his stay in the nation.
According to RFA, Anders Højmark Andersen, chairman of the Tibet Support Committee in Denmark said “This issue is being discussed in the press and it’s being dealt with by many ministerial and politicians. Several ministers have already commented that they will try to remedy these mistakes, This is the second report by the Tibet Commission which has dealt with the period from 1995 to 2015, so it covers 20 years. There have been more than 200 Chinese official visits to Denmark in this period but it also deals with Tibetans’ visits to Denmark like His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s visit.”
Although pro-Tibetan independence groups were allowed to demonstrate, they were frequently put in regions where visiting Chinese authorities would never come across them, according to Andersen. He said that Sino-Danish relations had been good since 2008 when Beijing and Copenhagen signed a strategic partnership, but that things have recently deteriorated.
Beijing has tried to bully other governments into silence, according to Mandie McKeown, executive director of the International Tibet Network in the United Kingdom, recalling that at least 12 governments issued a joint statement to the United Nations Human Rights Council in 2016 alleging that they had been targeted by Chinese pressure.
Leave a Reply