Tibetan capital still bears scars of unrest

LHASA, China (Reuters) - Tibet's exiled Dalai Lama remains a spiritual leader but is politically anathema, a senior monk in Lhasa told foreign reporters on an official visit that underscored tensions in the mountain region.

Lobsang Chopel, a senior monk at the Sera Buddhist monastery on the outskirts of Tibet's regional capital, said on Sunday that in his youth he was given spiritual lessons by the Dalai Lama and the exiled Buddhist leader remained a spiritual force.

But with government officials looking on, the 77-year-old monk dismissed the Dalai Lama as a political figure.

"Our Sera monastery is of the Gelupka school and the Dalai Lama is its most important lama, most important spiritual leader," he said, referring to the Dalai's branch of Tibetan Buddhism, also called the "Yellow hat" branch.

"In terms of religion, we believe in the Dalai Lama, but I don't believe or accept what he says or what he does."

China accuses the Dalai Lama, who fled into exile in India in 1959 after an abortive uprising against Chinese rule, of inciting protests and riots that erupted in Lhasa and then across wider Tibet in March, in a bid to undermine the Beijing Olympics. The Dalai Lama denies the charges.

Chinese authorities allowed about 30 foreign reporters to travel to Lhasa to watch the torch relay for the August 8 Olympics.

The overwhelming security around the torch ceremony underscored the government's hopes for a trouble-free patriotic spectacle more than three months after anti-government protests and then deadly anti-Chinese riots in Lhasa.

But times snatched away from government minders showed a city where anxiety and tension, and not Games excitement, dominated most people's lives.

The riots that erupted on March 14 partly reflected rancor over ethnic Han Chinese seen as doing too well from the influx of domestic and foreign tourists attracted to Tibet's intense spiritual life and stunning mountain scenery.

TORRENT OF TOURISTS

The torrent of tourists and central government spending has transformed Lhasa's streetscape, with neon-lit nightclubs, high-class shops and fancy four-wheel drives dominating the "new" part of Lhasa dominated by ethnic Chinese.

But now around the Barkhor area where the riots erupted and in other parts of Lhasa, Tibetans and Chinese seemed to share the same despair that it will be a long time before tourists return in any great numbers. Until then, life will be a struggle.

"Since the March 14 incident has been very big, foreign tourists have tailed off, in fact, basically been cut off," said Zheng Jie, a migrant from eastern China trying to sell Tibetan religious art next to the Potala Palace, the Dalai Lama's traditional seat. "Compared to last year, the number of Chinese tourists is also way down."

Taxi drivers said the dearth of business was driving many of them to bankruptcy.

"I'll leave as soon as I can. Sell all my four cars and move on," said one driver surnamed Zhang and originally from Hebei province in north China. "It will be a long time before Lhasa returns to normal -- two years, I'd say."

Many shops in the Barkhor area, a maze of alleys in the old Tibetan quarter of Lhasa, remain shut, and those that stay open are struggling to survive.

"The pilgrims don't buy anything from us. Instead, they ask for money," said Tsering, a salesman waiting for customers in the unlit gloom of a jewelry shop. Outside, a stream of Tibetan Buddhist pilgrims walked past, taking the circular route around the famed Jokhang temple, now shut to visitors.

Many Lhasa residents said it would take two years or longer before the city again began to attract large crowds of visitors.

But if Lhasa's residents are united in gloom over the drought of visitors, many remain divided by a gulf of distrust between Tibetans and ethnic Chinese deepened by the violence of March 14 and the subsequent crackdown.

"Tibetans are tough to live with, they'll fight you at the drop of a hat," said Zhang, the taxi driver. "March 14 wasn't an exception. It was what we have to put up with."

In the warren-like alleys of old Lhasa, there was little enthusiasm for Saturday's Olympic torch relay, but people were reluctant to even be seen speaking at length with foreigners.

(Editing by Nick Macfie)