Tensions Rise Between Tibetans, Chinese Muslims

June 23, 2008

Author: Barbara Demick

Source: The Los Angeles Times

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-muslims23-2008jun23,0,6800977.story

The riot began with a customer's complaint about her dinner.

"Waitress, there's a tooth in my soup," a Tibetan woman said indignantly.

Before long, a curious crowd of Tibetans gathered around the soup bowl. Restaurant owner Yun Sha came out of the kitchen and insisted that the offending item was just a chip off a lamb bone. "Let's trash this restaurant," Yun heard somebody scream, and the crowd proceeded to do just that.

Tables, chairs, a television flew through the air. Kitchen equipment was smashed with bricks. Soon the crowd had moved on to other Muslim restaurants on the same strip as terrified waiters and cooks scurried outside for safety.

Disputes such as that one last summer are common in western China, where a volatile ethnic stew is increasingly erupting into violence. Among China's dozens of minorities, few get along as badly as Tibetans and Muslims. Animosities have played a major -- and largely unreported -- role in the clashes that have taken place since mid-March. During the March 14 riots in the Tibetan region's capital, Lhasa, many of the shops and restaurants attacked were Muslim-owned. A mob tried to storm the city's main mosque and succeeded in setting fire to the front gate. Shops and restaurants in the Muslim quarter were destroyed.

Over the last five years, there have been dozens of clashes between Tibetans and Muslims in Sichuan, Gansu and Qinghai provinces, as well as in the Tibet Autonomous Region. Most of the incidents go unreported. The state-controlled news media are not eager to publicize anything that belies Communist Party claims that minorities live together in a "harmonious society."