It was disclosed by the Tibet Autonomous Regional Commission for Discipline Inspection of the Communist Party of China on Tuesday that 15 local Party officials were penalized for violating political discipline last year. A small number of Party officials, who allegedly joined underground Tibetan independence organizations, had provided intelligence to the Dalai Lama group or engaged in activities deemed harmful to China's security. They have also been put on file for investigation. Noticeably, in 2014, a few Party officials from Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region were also punished for discipline violations.

It is imperative to take such actions and make them public, which sends out a signal that inspires the whole of society. However, hostile forces outside China assert it's a campaign specifically directed against officials from ethnic minority groups. This is nonsense.

All Party officials are treated equally in the crackdown on disciplinary violations.

In Tibet, if there are officials who take an ambiguous attitude on the Tibetan independent question, colluding with separatist organizations and providing them with intelligence, they must be investigated and prosecuted regardless of their ethnicity.

In inland regions, recent years have also witnessed an unprecedented importance attached to bringing officials who severely violated Party discipline to account.

Ideological confusion is the root cause of why some Party officials acted against laws and discipline. They misjudged the trend of the times and lost their political confidence.

There is no doubt that most Party officials in Tibet support national policies and oppose separatism, though a few officials are in a troubled relationship with external separatist forces. There is no need to keep the fact of their discipline violations secret, or to exaggerate it.

Party officials in Tibet won't receive   favorable treatment for their support of separatists and they will pay the price for this. This must be made known to all Tibetan officials and to all Chinese people.

We should improve the livelihoods of those Party officials who love the country and are loyal to the Party while taking the few that betray the Party and the country as negative examples for others to learn by. It's the prerequisite for building a healthy environment in the border regions.

Ideology matters a lot in fighting against separatism. We must strengthen ideological and political education based on rules in the frontier regions.