U.N. council keeps silent on Tibet protests

By Louis Charbonneau

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The U.N. Security Council will likely keep silent about China's crackdown on demonstrations in Tibet, mostly due to worries that provoking Beijing would accomplish nothing, diplomats said on Monday.

China, which has sent in troops to enforce control in the regional capital Lhasa, said earlier that the violent protests by Tibetans were organized by followers of the Dalai Lama seeking to derail the Beijing Olympics in August. Tibet's exiled spiritual leader has denied this charge.

"The issue did not come up in the council," China's Deputy permanent U.N. representative Liu Zhenmin told Reuters after a meeting of the council on unrelated issues.

"This has nothing to do with peace and security," he said. "It is local violence, ... a domestic issue."

China, like the United States, Britain, France and Russia, is a permanent veto-wielding member of the council and would be able to block any attempts by the council to act on Tibet.

Russia's U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin, currently president of the council, told reporters that the 15-nation Security Council had no business discussing Tibet.

"It's clearly not a matter for the Security Council, or not for the United Nations," Churkin said.

One diplomat from a council member country, speaking on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the issue, told Reuters that the council would likely remain silent.

"I think the idea is that even calling for a discussion of this issue would be rejected by the Chinese and people wonder whether this would accomplish anything," he said.

Another diplomat confirmed this view.

NO SURPRISE

Jamie Metzl, vice president of the Asia Society, a New York-based group that promotes U.S.-Asian ties and awareness about Asia, said the council silence was no surprise.

"The Security Council is and always has been a politicized organization," he said, adding that China had enormous influence as a veto-wielding member of the council.

"But the Chinese authorities recognize that their ability to act forcefully in Tibet is limited ... particularly in the run-up to the Olympics," Metzl said.

The Dalai Lama has asked for an independent U.N. probe of the situation in Tibet. The human rights advocacy group Amnesty International called for a U.N.-led fact-finding mission.