Chinese Proverb: 'You Close the Door Before Beating Your Dog'

CHENGDU, China, March 18, 2008— -- I've been reporting on the Tibetan protests for several days now, and for the first time since I moved to China, I am seeing the full force of this nation's propaganda machine and the frightening might of its enormous military.

A few days ago, we went to a Tibetan neighborhood in Chengdu, the southwestern Sichuan city where we have been based. It was two days after the riots in Lhasa. There were police on every corner, clearly trying to intimidate the local Tibetans from starting any sort of protest. When we started filming the security operation, they told us to stop.

I explained that under China's new Olympic-related rules, foreign journalists are allowed to report without restriction, the police shrugged and hailed us a cab.

This small incident personifies the many inherent contradictions in China's policies — not only toward foreign journalists, but toward its own people. They make rules and enforce them until they no longer suit their aims. Their aim in this case seems all too clear— to conduct their crackdown of Tibetan protesters away from the scrutiny of cameras and reporters. There's a Chinese saying I heard the other day: "You close the door before beating your dog." It was a phrase tossed around a lot during the Tiananmen Square massacre in 1989.

Now, it might be invoked to describe the violent clashes between mostly unarmed protesters and China's police and army. They are closing the door. Except for reporters who work for the state-controlled media, no journalists have been granted a permit to report from Tibet since the protests.

A Hong Kong crew was kicked out of Lhasa for "illegal reporting." Countless journalists have been turned away at checkpoints on roads leading into Tibetan areas in China, including our ABC crew just today. Most reports that have leaked out were shot "undercover," often with camcorders and cell phones to evade detection by authorities.

Chinese state television has broadcast video showing Tibetan protesters attacking Chinese citizens and businesses, but they've shown no footage of troops retaliating against the Tibetan protesters. China says it never fired on protesters in Lhasa, but our sources in Tibet heard plenty of gunfire on the day of the riots and photos of dead bodies with gunshot wounds have leaked out from areas where there were demonstrations.