farm

os. mountains,
Ro -. to the next plain, hour after

Picture at right shows the Dalai Lama (left) and Panchen Lama (centre) with Chinese Premier Chou En-lai during their visit to Peking. In his epE A

articles, first of which appears on this page, Alan Winnington des cribes life in the land at the “roof of the world.”

Alan Winnington in Tibet

Journey by jeep over
‘roof of the world’

By ALAN WINNINGTON
LHASA, Tibet.

I am the first British corres-
Pondent to come here along the
Rew motor roads across the roof
of the world, to drive into Lhasa
from the east, to visit all Tibet’s
Main cities.

Until these roads—highest in
the world — were completed last
Year, there were no wheeled
Vehicles. A traveller walked or
rode on horseback. The trip I am
Making would have taken a year
or more,

Now it is possible to get most
of the way to Lhasa by public
transport—plane, rail and a bus
that covers 800 miles and crosses
eight major mountain ranges to
Chamdo.

But for convenience I am using
& Soviet jeep that can manage
€ven these mountains mostly in

Pp gear.

A “small’ and danggrous moun-

Mm pass — only twice as high
as Ben Nevis — has to be crossed
before the real climb on to the
Tibetan plateau begins.

Halfway up is Kanting, very
oo a frontier town, where

4ans and Tibetans live side by
Side and speak both languages.
ng-haired Tibetan clan lairds
and hunters stroll around with
Swords across their waists and
Tifles on their backs.
i om the moment that you
€ave Kanting and its earth-
‘Nostae and cross the Dzala Pass
about 14,000 feet, the Tibetan
teau begins..

The real Tibetan grasslands
after passing the first state
Pann, stablished in Tibet by the
as Army, and _ another
esses range where only the
ate ‘lumbering Tibetan yak—
Siig to the buffalo—can really
mil” work and give wool and

Waa ‘that point the route only
- Once below 10,000 feet for
€w miles, The jeep purrs along

© smooth road at 30 miles an’

Sur from one plain surrounded
through

Tib
its Ibet
of

i is. high, but southerly:
rder is only 300 miles north
ering Calcutta. It has
= €rsity of scene and climate
Probably cannot be matched.
world the _beauty spots of the
Lae > pertains : Lake District,
eel and, Arizona and the
tains an forests, the Rocky Moun-
_ have their counterparts
Tiber ve liberally displayed in

Every turn of the road offers

some scenic marvel. Among the
endless billowing peaks disap-
pearing into invisible distances.
with here and there austere giants
covered in perpetual snow, the
Tibetan landscape laconically un-
rolls vistas one after another that
would be famous tourist resorts
anywhere else and no doubt will

be here one day.

Here the clouds, of limitless
height, are whiter, the sky bluer,
the barleycorn yellower, the
rivers greener than anywhere on
the lowlands. In this rare air
and unfiltered sunshine, all
colors are heightened and made
transparent.

As the road~-climbs, the seasons
change and trees turn from sum-
mer green to autumn yellow, then
to winter bareness. Ten minutes
later there are no trees and soon
no flowers; then no grass, and
finally perpetual snow.

At intervals there are a few
herdsmen with their tents, or
merchants with pack animals in
long caravans, taking advantage
of the new road. Lorries pass
and wave—all carrying the sign
“Safety First.”

On top of Chula Mountain we
pass the Chengtu-Chamdo bus,

‘and later a group of Tibetans

waiting for it at a road mainten-
ance station.
m % nm

Tiny, but important Chamdo,
the first real Tibetan town on
the road, is reached by crossing
50 miles of plateau at 15,000 feet
and three great mountains.:

After the last mountain pass
there is an almost sheer drop of
4.500 feet to the city. Itis a hair-
pin road to end all hairpins. From
the top you can see the road
winding like a dropped. rope to
what appears to be the valley.

Driving down an hour in low
gear you think you have reached
the bottom. Then you turn a
corner and find that the road
goes on spinning down another

little |sheer drop far below to the Me-

kong River and Chamdo. :

On the way down there 1s
plenty of time to examine the
little town, spread out below like
an air-photo. Dominating it “is
the monastery with its golden
roofs. The rest of the town Is
either crumbling abode houses
or new white ones built since the
liberation.

White predominates.
are the People’s hospital, state
department and wholesale stores,
bank, municipal offices, hotel and
veterinary station.

There | .
‘nobles and the monasteries.

Chamdo was the first major
Tibetan city to be liberated after
the defeat of the Kuomintang.
It is the capital of one of Tibet’s
three regions, and has its own
People’s Representative Confer-
ence.

Here there is no industry and
only a few inefficient handi-
crafts.

Ploughshares weigh one or two
pounds and dig only four inches
deep; an ear of barley has five
or six grains: yak hides are
thrown away, while yak dung is

‘prized and sold as fuel; butter is

burned in the monasteries, while
imported cooking oil is sold on
the streets.

Monks are everywhere; rich
monks in fine, wine-red cloth;
poor monks in tattered robes that
may once have been the same
color; infant monks of three
years and impish boy monks play-
ing kites and getting cuffed by
irate mothers.

One Tibetan in four is born to
be a monk and he starts his
celibate career very young.

In Tibet, the custom when sick

was to pay a monk to pray. But
now the corridors and wards of
Chamdo’s modern hospital are
filled with Tibetans, many of
whom are themselves monks.
- The ‘hospital has treated 300,-
000 patients since it started in
1952, but the veterinary station
has found it harder to convince
the deeply religious herdsmen
that they should have their
cattle inoculated against epid-
emics. Chamdo’s mobile vet
teams already inoculated 25,000
cattle.

A gift to the district by the
central government last year of
60,000 iron farm tools has stim-
ulated interest, and the new state
department store is crowded with
peasants looking at such new
implements. Bicycles from East
Germany are drawing attention,
too.

But the biggest progress in this
region has been the reduction of
forced transport. Formerly the
common people had to drop what-
ever they ‘were doing and pro-
vide transport, without pay or
food, whenever ordered by
officials, nobles or monasteries.

After liberation, the People’s
Representative Conference de-
cided that the local and central
governments would pay for all
transport, though forced labor
still remains the right of the

Now in Chamdo there are film

'shows, modern dancing and new

boo

Office in Whitehall last week

In this second speech he also
went on to stress the Soviet de-
sire for friendship with Britain,
France and America and pointed
out the dangers to that friend-
ship posed by the actions of Sir
Winston Churchill, revealed by

the latter in his Woodford speech

last year. ,

On the earlier speech, without
bothering to check,, Sir Ivone
Kirkpatrick had complained to
the Soviet envoy in London that
Krushchev had accused the Bri-
tish government, of which Sir
Anthony Eden was a _ leading
member, of having launched the
German attack on the Soviet
Union.

Krushchey never said anything
‘of the kind, and in his second
speech at Rangoon he made the
matter clear enough even for Sir

\Ivone Kirkpatrick to understand.

Krushchey was addressing a
mass rally of Burma’s anti-fascist
People’s Freedom League, a rally
presided over by Burmese
Premier U Nu. ~

“Certain persons,” said Krush-
chev, “strongly dislike our visit
to India and Burma, and they
did not like our sincere, frank
statements.
“That is why certain organs of
the British press responded with
irritation to my speeches and to

Nottingham for
curtain of lace

Soviet Premier Bulganin. has
been unanimously invited by
Nottingham City Council to-visit
the city when he comes to
Britain next year.

The resolution was moved by
Councillor C. Butler, national
organiser of the Tobacco Work-
‘ers’ Union, and seconded by
Councillor Mrs. A. Hamilton.

“J would like to see a curtain

of Nottingham lace replace the
so-called Iron Curtain,” said Mrs.
Hamilton, who visited the Soviet
{Union two years ago.

mE

EE LPR

Press chided
by Krushchev

LONDON

There were embarrassed smiles at the British Foreign

and the reddest face was that

of Permanent Under-Secretary Sir Ivone Kirkpatrick. For
Nikita Khrushchev, secretary of the Soviet Communist party
made another speech in Rangoon which made it quite clear
he had been misrepresented when he had spoken about the
origins of the Second World War.

speeches made by Comrade Bul-
ganin in India.

“They especially did not like
that item in one of my speeches in
which I said certain circles untied
Hitler’s hands to launch a war
against the Soviet Union.

“But this is a historical fact.
Could Hitler have started the
war if he had been confronted
with the united forces of Bri-
tain, France, the Soviet Union
and other countries?

“Tf the ruling circles of Britain
and France at that time had
wished to hold back Hitler and to
prevent war, they would have
prevented the occupation of Aus-
tria by Hitler and would not have
agreed to the shameful Munich
agreements.”

Were not similar people “today
using the same methods, trying
to push Western Germany to start
on the path to war and new ad-
ventures?” he asked.

Showing again that he had no
intention of insulting the people
of Britain, Krushchev paid tribute
to their contribution to the defeat
of Hitler.

“This experience of our com-
mon fight for a common cause
had a tremendous significance.”

Then he added: “Finally you
should recollect the notorious
directive given by Churchill at
the end of the Second World
War to his. commander-in-chief
on the European battle front. _

“At that time Churchill ordered
(his commander) to collect and
keep arms which were thrown
away by the surrendering Hitler-
ite troops, to keep these Hitlerite
troops in readiness, because they
would possibly be of some use
against the Soviet Union—though
at that time the Soviet Union was
an ally of Britain.”

He concluded: “We stand for

) genuine friendship with Eng-
land, France, the United States
of America and other countries.
We want to be friends with all
peoples of the world.”

He praised the Burmese people
for their noble struggle against
colonialism and for their fight
for freedom and national inde-
pendence.

(See also text of Krushchev’s

speech on page 10).

PACIFIC TRIBUNE — DECEMBER 16, 1955 — PAGE 3

as Washi one