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Michigan: The Dalai Lama said he understands the sentiments of those protesting the upcoming Olympics in Beijing to draw attention to China's human rights record.
But the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader said on Friday he was sorry to see some of the demonstrations had turned violent. And he stressed that he supports the Beijing Games themselves.
"Demonstration is a way of expressing what you are feeling," he said at a news conference to begin a weekend visit to Ann Arbor. "In a purely non-violent way, that demonstration is right."
The Dalai Lama's comments follow a month of sporadic unrest in Tibetan-inhabited areas of western China, as well as protests that have followed the Olympic torch's passage to China.
Chinese police beat and detained dozens of ethnic Tibetans on Thursday in Qinghai province's Tongren county, reports said on Friday. The police action began after monks demanded the release of a fellow clergyman, they said.
The Dalai Lama said on Friday that shortly after the recent unrest began, he wrote a letter to the Chinese government and that contact was made through a "private channel." But he said there has been "no sign of the positive."
He did not specifically discuss the latest reports of unrest.
The spiritual leader also said a commitment to democracy should protect the right to peaceful protest, whether the cause is that of pro-Chinese demonstrators who have greeted him in his visit to the US or opposition to the Beijing Olympics.
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