The hopeless fault-finder. Illustration: Liu Rui/GT

After the notorious visit to Taiwan in 2022, former US House speaker Nancy Pelosi turned to the topic of Xizang. A group of US lawmakers, including Pelosi, met with the Dalai Lama in India on Wednesday. The secessionist Dalai Lama and these US politicians jointly staged a farce for grandstanding.

Anti-China is the political trait of these US politicians. Instead of truly caring about Xizang, their provocative behavior is purely to gain more political capital. However, any attempt to split China colluding with the Dalai clique is futile. In view of the current stability and development in the Xizang Autonomous Region, the influence of these US politicians is very limited.

When the US politicians met with the Dalai Lama on Wednesday despite China's objections, Pelosi accused China of trying to erase Tibetan culture. Pelosi seemed to have forgotten the tragic experience of the Native Americans, and instead was enthusiastic about making irresponsible remarks about Xizang. The Washington Post published an article on May 29 about the Indian boarding school. "As Native Americans were forced off their land and onto reservations, the government established day schools for their children. But US leaders concluded they needed to be more aggressive to fully eradicate their cultures," said the report. 

Different from the gradually disappearing language and culture of the Native Americans, Xizang's traditional culture has been carried forward. The Tibetan language is still commonly used among the Tibetans. Reading newspapers and watching TV programs in the Tibetan language are commonly seen in their life. Tibetan culture and religious activities are protected and respected.

The reason why Pelosi and other US politicians maliciously hype up Xizang-related issues is their consistent political bias and anti-China stance. From this standpoint, they ignore the ugliness in US history, turn a blind eye to the current situation of Native Americans, throw mud at China and interfere in China's internal affairs. Their ultimate purpose is to smear China, but the effect is exactly the opposite: it makes the world more clearly aware of the vicious intentions of Western anti-China forces.

Furthermore, the US House of Representatives passed the "Promoting a Resolution to the Tibet-China Dispute Act", or the "Resole Tibet Act", on June 12, in order to enhance US "support" for Xizang. "This bill is a message to the Chinese government that we have clarity in our thinking and understanding of this issue of the freedom of Tibet," Pelosi claimed during the ceremony. However, the US has no right to intervene in the Xizang-related issues.

The Xizang-related issues are not about ethnicity, religion or human rights hyped up by US politicians, but a major principle regarding China's sovereignty and territorial integrity. The Act passed by the US not only interferes in China's internal affairs, but also seriously violates international law and basic norms of international relations. It is just a piece of waste paper and is purely a self-amused performance. Those US politicians don't really care about the people in Xizang. Instead, they solely use culture and religion as excuses to discredit Xizang's development and slander China's ethnic policies, so as to support the secessionist forces in Xizang and undermine Xizang's prosperity and stability.

"In the face of history and reality, the Xizang-related bills passed by the US are hypocritical, groundless and outdated. They are incompatible with Xizang's current unity, social stability and rapid progress. It reveals the US' evil intentions to contain China's development by colluding with the Dalai clique," said Zhu Xiaoming, a researcher at the China Tibetology Research Center.

After encountering obstacles in issues related to Taiwan and the South China Sea, the US now takes out the "Xizang card" again at its wit's end. No matter how the West beautifies the Dalai Lama, he is an out-and-out secessionist who is more and more disdained by the international community. The last time he became a hit in the news was by asking a boy to suck his tongue, for which he was criticized as a pedophile. The "Dalai card" that US politicians think can win more political capital and create barriers for China is actually a lousy one. 

"These anti-China tactics and lame scripts will surely arouse strong indignation and unanimous condemnation from people of all ethnic groups in China, including the Tibetans, and will certainly be swept into the dust bin of history like previous failed Xizang-related bills they have concocted over the past few decades," Zhu said.