Introduction

While I have been writing this book, the Olympic torch has travelled around the world to promote the 2008 Olympic games in Beijing. After leaving Paris, talks were emerging to end its journey because of the tension the flame generated wherever it went. Although this sporting event has been part of popular culture for more than a century and was conceived to promote peace among all countries of the world, it has been turned into a political event by some to put pressure on the Chinese government to stop human rights abuses in Tibet.

China entered Tibet in 1949 and took full control of the country in 1959. Since then, Tibet's leader, the Dalai Lama, has lived in exile in the north of India. For Tibetans, he is a ‘god-king’ who is the temporal leader of Tibet and the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism. For many in the international community, he is seen as one of the great apostles of non-violence alongside Nelson Mandela and Mahatma Gandhi. Chinese officials, on the other hand have portrayed him as ‘a wolf in a monk's robe, a monster with a human face but the heart of a beast’ (Ramesh 2008).