Letter: Kosovo: no lectures from China, please

Sir: Bombing the Chinese embassy in Belgrade will have brought home to China the disadvantage of pursuing a violent approach to the resolution of conflict. The Chinese people are justifiably outraged. It is a global responsibility for world peace that all conflicts should be resolved through non-violent means. The Dalai Lama's visit to the UK is an opportunity to reassert this truth.

The Yugoslav solution in Kosovo has been to eliminate the problem of having a separate and distinct people living in their country who want more autonomy, through expelling and killing these people. The Chinese solution in Tibet is more subtle and long drawn-out but essentially the same - ethnic cleansing through the destruction of Buddhism, through discrimination against Tibetan educational and employment opportunities and in other ways.

It only requires China to see that the ethnic cleansing in Tibet is also wrong to create the possibility of finding a non-violent solution through granting more autonomy to the Tibetan people. As in Yugoslavia, there needs to be a change in attitude at the highest level in government.

JOHN HEATH

London NW1