China eager to show it's doing its best to aid Tibet quake victims

Premier Wen Jiabao flies to the remote region and pledges to 'build a good life for all ethnic people' in the restive area. The death toll tops 700.

April 15, 2010, By Barbara Demick

Reporting from Beijing — President Hu Jintao cut short his trip to South America on Thursday and Premier Wen Jiabao flew to a far-flung corner of the Tibetan plateau, pulling out all stops to portray a compassionate Chinese government doing all it can to help the victims of Wednesday's magnitude 6.9 earthquake.

The latest official figures list 760 people killed, 9,110 injured and more than 100,000 made homeless, the majority of them Tibetan. The earthquake took place in a politically tense region where many Tibetans have long chafed under Chinese rule.

After flying Thursday night to Qinghai province's Yushu county, close to the epicenter, Wen climbed atop a pile of rubble and pledged to "build a good life for all ethnic people after the earthquake."

The speech was translated simultaneously into Tibetan and appeared to be warmly received.

Shortly after the quake struck at 7:49 a.m. Wednesday, images from the scene showed Chinese soldiers and paramilitary members working hand in hand with local Tibetans, some of them Buddhist monks, in common cause to rescue quake victims.

"I think the Chinese already are looking at the larger implications of this earthquake. They see it as an opportunity for the Communist Party to win sympathy through its generosity," Robbie Barnett, a Tibet scholar at New York's Columbia University, said Thursday.

Early indications were that Chinese and Tibetans were working well together in the relief effort, Barnett said, adding that the Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, may also be looking for an opportunity to "find some common ground in the quake."

At a news conference in Beijing on Thursday, Zou Ming, disaster relief director for the Ministry of Civil Affairs, said there were nearly 10,000 rescuers on the scene in Yushu county, but supplies remained scarce.

"What we urgently need are tents, quilts, cotton-padded clothing and instant food," he said. "The most urgently needed material will be sent by air, the rest by train or road."

Zou said foreign aid workers would not be brought into the earthquake zone because of the difficult access.

The earthquake has raised great logistical challenges because Yushu county is 500 miles from the nearest major airport, through winding mountain passes at elevations of more than 12,000 feet.