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“THE 39TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE TIBETAN PEOPLE'S UPRISING” mentioning the U.S. Dept of State was published in the Senate section on pages S1798-S1799 on March 11, 1998.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
THE 39TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE TIBETAN PEOPLE'S UPRISING
Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I rise today to honor the concerned citizens in Chicago and around the world who have taken part in activities to commemorate the 39th Anniversary of the Tibetan People's Uprising of 1959.
Since China's brutal invasion of Tibet in 1949, Chinese rule has brought oppression and misery to a proud people whose national history extends back 2,000 years. Tibet functioned fully as an independent nation-state from 1911 until 1951, when China imposed its notorious so-
called ``17-Point Agreement on the Peaceful Liberation of Tibet,'' forcing the Tibetan government to acknowledge Chinese sovereignty.
As China consolidated its power during the 1950s, refusing to permit even the regional autonomy permitted under the treaty, Tibetan resistance grew. It came to a head in the People's Uprising, which was suppressed by the Red Army at the cost of thousands of civilian lives. The Dalai Lama, Tibet's head of state and the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhists, was forced into exile in India, where he has been campaigning for the freedom of Tibet ever since.
The International Campaign for Tibet estimates that, during the 20 years following the uprising, some 1.2 million Tibetans, about one fifth of the country's population, perished due to China's policies. Many more were imprisoned, went into exile, or disappeared. More than 6,000 monasteries, temples and other cultural and historic buildings were destroyed. The Chinese occupation of Tibet stands as a monument to the worst excesses of Communist tyranny.
The U.S. Department of State and international human rights organizations continue to document acts of repression by Chinese authorities in Tibet even today. According to reports cited in the State Department's Human Rights Report for 1997, ``Chinese government authorities continued to commit serious human rights abuses in Tibet, including instances of torture, arbitrary arrest, detention without public trial, and long detention of Tibetan nationalists for peacefully expressing their political views. Tight controls on religion and on other fundamental freedoms continued and in some cases intensified.''
Amnesty International cited ``grossly unfair trials, widespread torture and ill-treatment in police cells, prisons and labor camps,'' and concluded that ``despite some legal changes, Chinese legislation still allowed more than 200,000 to be detained in 1997 without charge or trial for `re-education through labor.' ''
The Chinese government's claims of success in its recent economic development policies in Tibet are also misleading: the favorable economic and tax policies have disproportionately benefitted ethnic Chinese residents rather than native Tibetans. Consequently, these policies ``have attracted growing numbers of ethnic Han and Hui immigrants from other parts of China, that are competing with--and in some cases displacing--Tibetan enterprises and labor,'' according to the U.S. State Department.
The United States must not allow China to use Tibet's geographic and political isolation to obscure our view of the situation. The fate of Tibet and its people also must not be sacrificed to diplomatic expediency in a short-sighted effort to improve U.S. relations with China. If the Chinese government wishes to join the community of responsible nations, it must act responsibly. It must improve its human rights performance and resume negotiations on Tibet's future. We in Congress should call upon the Administration to introduce a resolution dealing with the serious human rights abuses in China and Tibet at the March 16 meeting of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights in Geneva.
As the Dalai Lama has said, ``Brute force, no matter how strongly applied, can never subdue the basic human desire for freedom and dignity. It is not enough, as communist systems have assumed, merely to provide people with food, shelter and clothing. The deeper human nature needs to breathe the precious air of liberty.'' It is time the government of China paid heed to his wise words.
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