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M. Speaker - I rise today in strong support of this important resolution. I thank my friend Congressman Rush Holt, Speaker Pelosi, and the Chairman and Ranking Member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, for their leadership in the long struggle for freedom, dignity and human rights in Tibet.
M. Speaker, for six decades, the history of Tibet is marked by violence. Even before 1949, the People's Liberation Army of China entered the eastern areas of Tibet during The Long March. In 1951, they finally occupied the capital of Lhasa.
Fifty years ago, on March 10th, the Tibetan people rose up in Lhasa against Chinese rule. The backlash was furious and brutal. On March 17th, the Dalai Lama fled Lhasa for his own safety, joined by some 80,000 Tibetans for life in exile. Tens of thousands of Tibetans who remained were killed or imprisoned.
Thanks to thriving exile communities in India, Europe and the United States, Tibetan cultural identity, language and religion have survived. They have focused world attention on the Tibetan struggle. But each year and every year, the situation inside Tibet grows worse - with more repression, more arrests, more displacement, more deliberate destruction of the Tibetan language, culture and religion.
One year ago, new protests rose up in Tibet. They were the result of greater controls over religious and cultural activities, development that mainly benefited Chinese migrants, and forced resettlement of Tibetan farmers and nomads. Thousands were arrested.
To date, there has been no full accounting by Chinese authorities of those arrested, detained, tried, sentenced or released.
No access to those detained by the International Committee of the Red Cross or other international observers.
And all the time, the Tibetan people daily become more of a minority in their own land.
M. Speaker, as the new Co-Chair of the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission, it is humbling to follow in the footsteps of Tom Lantos. The Congressional Human Rights Caucus, which he founded, was the very first to give the Dalai Lama a voice on Capitol Hill in 1987.
On this 50th Anniversary, let's be very clear that the American people and this House stand with His Holiness. We will not rest until meaningful and full autonomy for the Tibetan people is achieved - and the Dalai Lama and his people can fulfill their dream of returning home to Tibet.
