“The question is, should Canada consider Tibet to be an independent state, a vassal of China, or an integral portion of China.  It is submitted that the Chinese claim to sovereignty over Tibet is not well founded.  Chinese suzerainty, perhaps existent, though ill-defined, before 1911, appears since then, on the basis of facts available to us, to have been a mere fiction.  In fact, it appears that during the past 40 years Tibet has controlled its own internal and external affairs.  Viewing the situation thus, I am of the opinion that Tibet is, from the point of view of international law, qualified for recognition as an independent state.”

“I find it hard to see how the question of suzerainty comes into the matter.  First of all the Chinese never ratified the agreement by which Chinese suzerainty but Tibetan autonomy were agreed to [the Simla Convention].  In the second place even if it had been agreed to, suzerainty is hardly the same as sovereignty, particularly when autonomy is part of the bargain.  In the third place, if China owned Tibet, there would be no point in having discussions with the Tibetans about mutual relations and certainly no point in sending an army to conquer it.  The sending of an army is surely a confession that the matter is not domestic.”

“After the Communist invasion of 1950 the Chinese sought to establish physical control of the country…  Despite the promise of internal autonomy [in the 17 Point Agreement], the Chinese Government apparently began preparations to exert full sovereignty over Tibet.”

“Chinese were both shocked and surprised by the sudden violence of the outbreak which took place on and after March 19th.  The basic cause of the latest, and all Tibetan uprisings was Tibetan dislike and distrust of their Chinese conquerors – not merely of new ideas and reforms. 

There is also a letter from Prime Minister Diefenbaker to His Holiness the Dalai Lama, dated September 29, 1960.  Diefenbaker was apparently responding to an earlier letter from His Holiness, and his short reply is courteous but noncommittal.  He only says that Canada will be “receptive” to initiatives dealing with “the human rights of the people of Tibet.”

“In previous sessions, the issue of the international status of Tibet, Chinese claims to sovereignty over Tibet, and international intervention and investigation were avoided primarily because those nations which were disturbed by events in Tibet considered that the United Nations had no means of taking effective action.”

When the Canadian government announced Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s upcoming trip to China in mid-February 2012, its news release celebrated “deepening economic ties”.  The release also noted that 2010 marked 40 years of diplomatic relations between Canada and the People’s Republic of China.  Nowhere was mention of issues like human rights or the self-immolation crisis in Tibet, let alone the issue of what right China has to rule what Canada once called the country of Tibet.

“[H]ad China been a member of the United Nations it would not have acted differently in Tibet but would have suffered greater embarrassment and loss of prestige than it in fact has – perhaps not immediately but at least in the long run, as the case would well have remained open for a number of years and even Communist governments which ignore external pressure at any given moment are not entirely insensitive to attrition over the long haul.  The Tibetans too might have been given something to hope for.  Admittedly, the failure of the United Nations to act on the Tibetan appeals of 1950 might have been regarded in some quarters as a precedent restricting the action in support of Tibet in 1959 – even if China had been a member of the United Nations Organization.  However, the simple fact is that the Chinese broke the 1951 Sino-Tibetan treaty which had embodied the principle of Tibetan autonomy.  Furthermore, the treaty was a dictated one made possible by force of arms – the same type of “unequal treaty” the Chinese have so often attacked and repudiated where they were the affected party.  The Tibetans are therefore entitled to consideration in the United Nations which, it may be recalled, had not shrunk from taking up the case of the British in Cyprus (or the French in Algeria or a variety of similar cases) where the British (French or other) claim was not unlike that of China’s to control Tibet.  The fact that salt water rather than mountain ranges intervened between the respective large and small countries is quite irrelevant.  It is sometimes agreed that United Nations intervention over Tibet – even if China had been a member – would have complicated the situation and detracted from the benefits accruing from Asian disillusionment with Chinese communism.  There may be some merit in this type of reasoning but if the United Nations acts only in certain cases and dodges those of an inconvenient nature its long run effectiveness will be severely restricted.”

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Sadly, the point seems to be lost or obscured in the arguments being made for why the Middle Way is supposedly in harmony with Article 31. 

Arguing for Middle Way-Article 31 harmony is, unfortunately, wishful thinking.  The mistake is in interpreting a legal clause without regard for the completely different political context, legal system, and philosophical framework in which the clause developed.  It would be like reading the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment (“Congress shall make no law …abridging the freedom of speech…”) ignorant of the vast body of case law setting out when Congress can actually abridge free speech. 

Given the reality of Chinese constitutional law, any autonomy under China’s Article 31 is only a temporary one, granted for the specific purpose of incrementally integrating a territory into the People’s Republic of China.  That is why it is almost impossible that China would ever consider applying it to Tibet.   China already “owns” Tibet, in its view. 

Thus, it would be reasonable to say that the CTA’s attempt to link the Middle Way policy with Hong Kong’s expiring autonomy may be well-meaning, but is painfully ironic and dangerously unrealistic or naïve.  We believe that open and objective debate of the pros and cons of any idea leads to better policy.  Therefore we are optimistic that participation from Tibetan citizens around the world will help the Tibetan movement improve its approach.  Such free debate will hopefully lead to a stronger policy in the best interests of the Tibetan people.

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The video shows Chinese police going from house to house in systematic fashion and arresting an unknown number of Tibetans. The video ends with these prisoners apparently transported to a detention center. The fate of the Tibetan detainees in this video is unknown. The Tibetan Government-in-Exile did not elaborate on how it obtained this video but presumably it was leaked from someone inside Tibet who had access to this video.

The video and the photos show the extent of the security crackdown in Tibet after the mass protests in 2008 and perhaps recently in Ngaba after the self-immolations. They demonstrate the sweeping and arbitrary nature of arrests conducted in Tibet and the high level of repression against Tibetans. From these images, we can see that Tibet has become a police state since 2008 where heavily armed security forces arrest suspected Tibetan protestors and patrol streets like an occupying army. For example, more than 800 Chinese police are stationed around Kirti Monastery, where most of the monks who self-immolated are from.

The video and photos also clearly show the lack of any respect for the individual rights of Tibetans.  None of the suspects in this video are informed of their rights during their arrests. Many former Tibetan political prisoners in exile have stated that during the entire time they were in custody, no one informed them of their rights nor did they have access to legal counsel. In addition, the photos of Tibetans being paraded around the town violate international laws against public humiliation of detainees and prisoners. The video also shows the Chinese security forces using a large number of armed men to arrest single unarmed individuals at a time, including one elderly woman. Their use of force seems out of proportion to the situation. None of the Tibetans arrested in this video appear to have resisted arrest or were armed or were in any way exhibited violent behavior.

Unfortunately, the video also show a number of Tibetans in Chinese police uniforms participating in the arrests. We recognize Tibetans working for the Chinese authorities do not have the right to refuse orders and risk their jobs and welfare of their families if they do not comply. Nevertheless, we would hope that Tibetans would not work for the Chinese security forces, knowing that one day they might have to arrest or harm their fellow Tibetans. But we also recognize that life under foreign occupation presents challenges and calculations that are hard to fully comprehend or judge from the safety of exile. We also recognize that the most likely source of this leaked video is a Tibetan working in the Chinese security establishment, who bravely ensured that this evidence came to light.

The video and the photos of the security crackdown in Ngaba stand in stark contrast to the images of Tibetans presented in Chinese official websites and in propaganda tours conducted by China in foreign countries. Chinese propaganda literatures always show Tibetans smiling, dancing or singing or working hard for the “Motherland.”  Chinese official news like Xinhua, CCTV, and Lhasa TV never show mass arrests of Tibetans or Tibetan as prisoners except in a few cases related to stories about a few Tibetan “splittists” being convicted of crimes against “national unity.” Tibetans inside Tibet refer to official media channels as 'Tungoi Gato dang Gyalchei Chakgo' roughly meaning 'China's Joy and International tragedy'.

This recently leaked video of a police raid near Lhasa and the photos from Ngaba demonstrate the reality of Tibet today. As Tibetan Prime Minister-in-Exile Lobsang Sangay said in his inaugural address, life in Tibet is not a socialist paradise. Tibet under Chinese rule is a draconian police state where the Tibetan people live in constant fear of harassment, arrest, detention and persecution by the authorities. Anyone who has a dissenting voice is imprisoned and tortured. While the Chinese Government loudly proclaims that Tibetans have human rights, this video and these photos disprove China’s false claims.

*In the video, the men in camouflage are identified as Border Security and some of the detainees are handed over to them.