WASHINGTON, March 17 (UPI) -- One sobering aspect of the tragedy of Tibet is to consider a list of the places in the world where abuses of human rights are most common. Darfur in Sudan, Zimbabwe, North Korea, Myanmar (or Burma), Uzbekistan and Tibet would come high on most peoples' lists.

And what they have in common is the crucial enabling role of China. Tibet, where the official Chinese figure of 10 dead in the disturbances of the last four days is dwarfed by the more reliable reports from inside the country of more than 100 dead, has been under direct Chinese rule since 1951.

Tibet has been ruled with an iron hand, while also being colonized by the deliberate immigration of vast numbers of Han Chinese as part of what the Dalai Lama calls "cultural genocide." Han Chinese shopkeepers have been a particular target of the latest riots.

It should not be forgotten that China's current leader, Hu Jintao, boats in his credentials for high office his ruthless role in crushing the last round of Tibetan unrest in 1989-90, when he was party chief in Lhasa. It was an unruly time, following the death of the Panchen Lama, an important Buddhist religious leader (and may Tibetan exiles suspect Hu of having a hand in his passing) and the award of the Nobel Peace Prize to the Dalai Lama.

Hu imposed martial law, sent 2,000 troops into the Tibetan districts of Lhasa, and somewhere between 40 and 120 Tibetans were killed. Many hundreds were arrested, and the reports of the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Torture contain heart-rending accounts of their fate.