VZCZCXRO7450
PP RUEHCN RUEHGH RUEHVC
DE RUEHBJ #0648/01 0711137
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
P 121137Z MAR 09
FM AMEMBASSY BEIJING
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 2845
INFO RUEHOO/CHINA POSTS COLLECTIVE PRIORITY
RUEHKT/AMEMBASSY KATHMANDU 3863
RUEHNE/AMEMBASSY NEW DELHI 4757
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHINGTON DC
RUEKJCS/SECDEF WASHINGTON DC
RHEHNSC/NSC WASHDC

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 BEIJING 000648 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/12/2034 
TAGS: PHUM PGOV PREL KIFR CH
SUBJECT: TIBETAN QINGHAI: FOREIGNERS BANNED, ARMED  POLICE 
DEPLOYED, EVEN ACCESSIBLE AREAS TENSE 
 
REF: A. OSC JPP20090227969067 
     ¶B. 2008 BEIJING 3966 
     ¶C. 2008 BEIJING 2679 
     ¶D. 2008 BEIJING 1351 
 
Classified By: Classified by Political Minister Counselor 
Aubrey Carlson.  Reasons 1.4 (b) and (d). 
 
 ¶1. (C) SUMMARY:  All Tibetan areas in Qinghai are 
closed to foreigners, PolOffs were told by local 
security officials during a March 10-11 trip to the 
province, even as enforcement was uneven and 
confusion reigned over exactly which locations were 
off-limits.  Journalists and other foreigners were 
turned away from Tongren, a center for Tibetan art 
and tourist destination, while in Guinan, Hainan 
Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, a heavy People's 
Armed Police (PAP) presence seemed prepared for 
trouble.  Travel restrictions were stricter than 
during the last half of 2008, resembling those 
implemented immediately after the March 2008 riots. 
Local security officials funneled foreigners wishing 
to visit Qinghai's Tibetan areas to Kumbum Monastery 
(Ta'er Si), a monastery near the capital Xining that 
has not experienced major unrest, but even there the 
atmosphere was tense, with one monk reporting that 
armed police had been deployed around the monastery. 
Dalai Lama portraits were nevertheless on display in 
several parts of the monastery, even in close 
proximity to security surveillance cameras.  END 
SUMMARY. 
 
¶2. (C) PolOffs traveled to Qinghai Province March 
10-11 in an attempt to visit majority Tibetan areas 
but were mostly unable to do so due to a ban on 
travel by foreigners to all Tibetan areas in 
Qinghai.  PolOffs briefly visited the Tibetan town 
of Guinan (Mangra) before being ordered back to the 
capital city Xining.  There, PolOffs visited Kumbum 
Monastery (Ta'er Si), a large Tibetan Buddhist 
monastery and prominent tourist site. 
 
QINGHAI'S TIBETAN AREAS CLOSED, ENFORCEMENT UNEVEN 
--------------------------------------------- ----- 
 
¶3. (C) All ethnic Tibetan areas in Qinghai Province 
are currently closed to foreigners, according to 
local and provincial police in Xining and Guinan. 
PolOffs nevertheless observed inconsistent 
implementation of this rule by confused local 
officials, allowing foreigners (including PolOffs) 
to travel unimpeded into Tibetan areas, only to be 
told on arrival they were in violation of the travel 
restrictions.  Bus tickets were still being sold to 
foreigners at Xining's major bus station for 
destinations in Tibetan areas, and a uniformed 
Public Security Bureau (PSB) officer claimed to 
PolOffs that foreigner travel to Tibetan areas was 
not restricted.  Asked for clarification as to which 
areas were currently restricted, provincial PSB 
officials provided a list to PolOffs of areas 
purportedly open and closed to foreigners as of 
April 2005.  The document listed several Tibetan 
areas as "open," including Tongren, Tongde, Guide, 
Maduo and all of Yushu County, even as those same 
officials informed PolOffs of the blanket 
restriction on all Tibetan areas.  PSB officials 
were seeking to direct all foreigners interested in 
visiting Tibetan areas to visit Kumbum Monastery, a 
large monastery that has not had major 
demonstrations, near Xining. 
 
TONGREN OFF-LIMITS, DESPITE BEING ON "OPEN" LIST 
--------------------------------------------- --- 
 
¶4. (C) PolOffs attempted to travel from Xining to 
Tongren (Rebgong in Tibetan), Huangnan Tibetan 
Autonomous Prefecture, which is home to Longwu 
Monastery, a major center for Tibetan art and a 
common tourist destination.  PolOffs were told by 
numerous drivers that the area had been recently 
closed to foreigners, and the drivers refused to 
take PolOffs to the area.  Foreign journalists in 
Xining who had attempted to travel to the area 
reported that the area was closed and that they had 
been told to return immediately to Xining. 
 
BEIJING 00000648  002 OF 003 
 
 
Provincial PSB officials in Xining told PolOffs that 
travel to Tongren was closed to foreigners, despite 
the "open" designation for Tongren on the "official" 
list of closed and open areas they provided. 
 
CONFUSION AT THE CHECKPOINTS 
---------------------------- 
 
¶5. (C) PolOffs on March 10 eventually located a 
driver willing to travel to the majority Tibetan 
town of Guinan (Mangra), Hainan Tibetan Autonomous 
Prefecture.  This driver told PolOffs that he had 
taken several other Westerners to the same area the 
week before.  PolOffs traveled through two police 
checkpoints on the road to Guinan without being 
turned back, even though the vehicle was stopped and 
the driver asked to produce registration and 
insurance information.  Upon arrival in Guinan, 
however, PolOffs were immediately approached by 
local police and told that the area was "closed to 
foreigners."  Local PSB officials ordered PolOffs to 
depart, hastily arranging for transportation for the 
journey back to Xining.  The police officials said 
the area was closed because they could not guarantee 
the "safety" of foreigners in their town but 
declined to provide details on the nature of the 
supposed threat to public order. 
 
GUINAN TENSE, POLICE READY FOR TROUBLE 
-------------------------------------- 
 
¶6. (C) In Guinan, PolOffs observed at least five 
People's Armed Police (PAP) trucks and more than 30 
PAP equipped with riot gear and body armor.  The 
security forces had set up a semi-permanent camp 
with at least five large tents directly behind the 
local Communist Party headquarters and main 
government building.  Local police acknowledged to 
PolOffs that the week of March 10 was a 
"particularly sensitive period," but declined to 
provide additional information on the nature of the 
threat.  (Note:  Radio Free Asia (ref A) reported 
that a group of 100 monks had marched on the Guinan 
city government building during the Tibetan New Year 
in February to protest government policies toward 
Tibetans.  Other foreign journalists, however, told 
PolOffs that they had not been able to independently 
confirm the report.  Separately, a monk resident at 
Guinan's Lucang Monastery informed PolOff via phone 
on March 6 that there was "trouble" (mafan) in 
Guinan.  The monk, who frequently visits Beijing, 
told PolOff it was "inconvenient" (bu fangbian) for 
him to travel.) 
 
RESTRICTIONS TIGHT DURING SENSITIVE ANNIVERSARIES 
--------------------------------------------- ---- 
 
¶7. (C) The blanket restriction on travel to Tibetan 
areas, even if unevenly implemented at the local 
level, was in contrast to the slight relaxation of 
access for foreigners to less sensitive areas of 
Tibetan Qinghai during the last half of 2008 (refs 
B,C).  The situation now more closely resembles that 
of the period immediately after the March 2008 riots 
in Lhasa and other Tibetan areas, when travel 
restrictions were hastily implemented for most 
Tibetan areas in China (ref C).  The heightened 
restrictions reflect greater official concern over 
possible protests or other civil disturbances during 
the one-year anniversary of the widespread riots in 
Tibetan areas in March 2008 and the 50th anniversary 
of the 1959 failed Tibetan uprising and the Dalai 
Lama's flight to India.  (Note:  The restrictions 
encountered by PolOffs appear to have been 
heightened recently, in anticipation of the March 
anniversaries.  Canadian Embassy Political Officer 
Louis-Martin Aumais told PolOff March 12 that, 
during a visit to Qinghai the week of February 23 to 
review Canadian aid projects in the province, Aumais 
had been able to travel "largely unimpeded" 
throughout the province, even to ethnic Tibetan 
areas, with the approval of local Foreign Affairs 
Office officials.) 
 
KUMBUM MONASTERY TENSE 
---------------------- 
 
BEIJING 00000648  003 OF 003 
 
 
 
¶8. (C) PolOffs visited Kumbum Monastery (Ta'er Si in 
Mandarin) near Xining, which provincial PSB 
officials said was the only Tibetan monastery open 
to foreigners.  Even in this tourist-friendly 
monastery outside of the majority Tibetan areas, 
however, there were signs of tension.  Monks were 
generally unwilling to engage in conversation with 
PolOffs, and security surveillance cameras were 
ubiquitous, including in areas of worship.  One 
older monk, who refused to give his name, rejected 
PolOff's assertion that the monastery seemed calm. 
The monk claimed that numerous armed police had 
"surrounded" the compound beginning on March 10 and 
that movement by monks was severely restricted.  A 
foreign journalist and photographer who visited 
later that same day told PolOffs they had been 
expelled from the monastery by uniformed police 
officers after attempting to take pictures of monks. 
Yet, at least two large portraits of the Dalai Lama 
in his youth were on display in relatively less- 
visited parts of the monastery, including one in a 
room adjacent to a worship hall that was monitored 
by a surveillance camera. 
 
MONKS TOLD TO FULFILL "PATRIOTIC RESPONSIBILITY" 
--------------------------------------------- --- 
 
¶9. (C) In a sign that authorities had taken 
precautions against the possibility of unrest in the 
Kumbum Monastery, PolOffs noted a "Responsibility 
Notice" (zeren shu), dated March 5, that was posted 
on monastery walls.  The notice requires that monks 
"be patriotic" and attend all "religious activities 
and various activities organized by the monastery." 
If monks have "matters to attend to outside," they 
must "apply for leave at various levels."  The 
document threatened with expulsion any monk who 
"harms the monastery's image or the interests of the 
monks." 
PICCUTA