Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That, in the opinion of the Senate, the following is a matter of urgency:The bloodshed in Tibet and the need for strong, decisive action by the government to insist that international laws and norms, including those safeguarding human and political rights and media access, are observed by China.

While we enjoy the democracy of this great country of ours, seven million Tibetans live to our north stripped of their democratic rights, stripped of their right to freedom of speech, stripped of their right to freedom of religious observance and generally made noncitizens in their own country. The last week has seen an outbreak of violence in Tibet unparalleled for at least the last 20 years, when a crackdown in Lhasa under the now President of communist China, Hu Jintao, involving the shooting of many people in Lhasa led to the end of civil unrest at that time. Now we are seeing a huge outbreak of feeling by Tibetans in Tibet proper and in the other Tibetan provinces to the north and east of Lhasa.

One only has to reflect on the danger for the monks and nuns who began marching from Sera monastery and other monasteries into Lhasa last week to understand the strong feelings of the Tibetan people, who have such a record of devotion to freedom and nonviolence, which must be exhibiting itself in their own hearts. I have been to the monasteries from which many of the monks and nuns come. I have been in Tibet and have seen the suppression of the ability of people to speak up for their rights. And I can only imagine the horror and the fear and the terror in the hearts of those Tibetans who have decided to make a stand for the country they love and for the religion which they believe so wholeheartedly in.

The reports from Tibet vary. The official news agency Xinhua says that 10 people have been killed and that these were Chinese shop owners and hotel owners. The reports coming out of the exiled government of Tibet indicate 80 to 100 Tibetans have been shot or otherwise killed in the last few days. What is at stake here is the international community’s own standing in upholding the rights of people who are cruelly suppressed. Let me put this from the outset: we are dealing here with a repressive, dictatorial communist regime in Beijing. It is a police state. Since the events of last week, for example, internet communications to do with Tibet have been shut down by the 40,000 internet police who routinely on behalf of that police state intervene in the communications of people within Tibet. CNN, the one outside entity which has the right to broadcast in and from China, whenever it goes to the Tibet issue is blacked out currently in China. Internet service providers are shut down if they try to facilitate traffic on the matter. That is one half of it. On the other half, we can know from past performance that those good and true Tibetans who have, through the anguish of their hearts, taken the courage to stand up against this brutal regime in Tibet and elsewhere in China have been and are now in pretty horrendous circumstances.

I call on the government of this country to take some reasonable action against the repression by China and in support of the seven million Tibetans. So far we have had the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, say that he is disturbed by what is going on in Tibet—and who isn’t—and that he has had diplomatic communications go to and from China, whatever that means. And he has called for restraint, whatever that means. But we have seen nothing here from our own Prime Minister demanding that the Chinese government allow access for the free media, that it guarantee the rights of the Tibetans and indeed all Chinese under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which China has signed, and that Tibetans’ rights are guaranteed as they are written under the Chinese Constitution, a part of the Constitution which has been observed in the breach by this government.

The difference is non-existent between the Howard government’s failure, its acquiescence to the dictatorial government in Beijing, and the Rudd government’s now. I ask this, Mr Acting Deputy President Forshaw: why has Prime Minister Rudd not called in the Chinese ambassador, Zhang Junsai? Is this not so important that the Chinese ambassador should not hear what the Australian nation feels about the repression of Tibetans and about the need to uphold their rights right across the board? What are these diplomatic exchanges that Prime Minister Rudd tells us about but will not reveal? What we have here effectively is the Rudd government resorting to diplomatic niceties while blood is flowing in the streets of Lhasa. We have the Rudd government failing to take a stand for the rights which we as Australians not only take as central to our democracy but have had our own blood shed for.

Let me say this unequivocally: we are now a globalised society and when governments fail to stand up for the basic tenets of freedom of speech, freedom of religious observance and political rights anywhere in the world, they are failing to do it domestically as well. We are part of an international community, and the Australian people expect better. When it came to the monks and nuns protesting in Rangoon last year, under the Howard government, Mr Rudd said:

It’s important for the international community to unite in their condemnation of the Burmese regime.

Why is he not saying it is now important for the international community to unite in their condemnation of the Beijing regime? He said:

I noticed Mr Downer, the Foreign Minister, said the other day that these sorts of sanctions—

that is, targeted sanctions on the Burmese leaders—

were not effective. Labor’s view is that they are useful and they should be adopted ...

Where are you now, Prime Minister Rudd? Why will you not now consider targeted sanctions on the repressive, dictatorial regime in Beijing so that the leaders in Beijing will know that we are standing up for the rights we believe in? Mr Rudd said of Burma:

That policy of constructive engagement with the Burmese regime has conspicuously failed.

But that is a policy he has adopted himself now towards Beijing. He said:

When it comes to Burma and the abuse of human rights, the international community, including Australia, must speak with one strong, united voice.

I say to Prime Minister Rudd: how about calling on the international community, Australia included, to speak with one strong, united voice against the abuse of human rights in Tibet? You will have the Australian people with you, Prime Minister, if you get the backbone to stand up, look the Beijing communist regime straight in the eye and say, ‘We do not support the brutal military occupation of Tibet.’ The Dalai Lama, long ago—in the 1980s—took the middle road and said, ‘Give us genuine autonomy.’ The brutes in Beijing have turned their back on that, and the Dalai Lama has not got the support from the Australian governments that you would have expected to have come behind that, all the way down the six contacts with the Chinese authorities since 2002. What the Tibetans have found is that every time they go to ask Beijing to make some concession, they get trodden on. The Australian government and the Australian Prime Minister should do better. (Time expired)