I'm with the banned: China blocks Bon Jovi gigs

Bon Jovi fans in China have been given a taste of bad medicine after authorities pulled the plug on plans for the group’s first concerts in the country.

The band were scheduled to perform in Shanghai next Monday and in Beijing the following Thursday. Tickets were priced from 480 to 3,880 yuan (£49-£395). The ticketing website Damai.cn posted on its official Weibo account that it had stopped selling tickets for the gigs.

It is believed the concerts were scrapped because the band used an image of the Dalai Lama as a backdrop at a gig in Taiwan in 2010, the Financial Times reported.

The concerts were to have been Bon Jovi’s first in China and had been eagerly promoted by band members. In August Jon Bon Jovi sang in Mandarin on a recording of the Moon Represents My Heart, a popular love song, as a “special gift to Chinese fans” before the dates.

Bon Jovi are not the first to have shows cancelled in China after showing support for the Dalai Lama. In July Maroon 5 had their Shanghai concerts cancelled, reportedly because of a happy birthday message on Twitter from one of the band members to the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader.

In 2009 Oasis were forced to cancel shows because Noel Gallagher had performed at a Free Tibet concert in New York.

Chinese officials have expressed their disapproval of the Dalai Lama’s appearance at Glastonbury this year, saying it was tantamount to giving him a platform to engage in anti-China activities. In 2012 Beijing froze all top-level diplomatic contact with the UK after David Cameron’s decision to meet the spiritual leader.

On Tuesday Beijing marked the 50th anniversary of the establishment of Tibet as an administrative region under Chinese control with a ceremony in the regions’ capital, Lhasa. Thousands gathered in front of the Potala Palace waving Chinese flags, the official Xinhua news agency reported, as a top official made a speech saying that China would crackdown on all kinds of “separatist activities”.

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Beijing established the Tibet autonomous region in 1965, 15 years after Chinese troops took control of the area.

The Dalai Lama has lived in exile in India since 1959 and received the Nobel peace prize in 1989. China’s Communist party accuses him of being a violent separatist. The Dalai Lama denies seeking independence and says he only wants genuine autonomy for Tibet.