Dharamshala: - The Central Tibetan Administration in a release dated 26 October 2013 said that "today large parts of Tibet are still under martial law like control" and rejected "the false claims of the recent 'White Paper' on the issue of Tibet."
"The ultimate judge of China's rule in Tibet should be the Tibetan people. Even after 60 years of China's invasion of Tibet and more than 50 years after Tibet came under the complete control of Beijing in the aftermath of the repression which crushed that year's popular uprising against Chinese rule, today large parts of Tibet are still under martial law like control," said CTA in a press statement.
CTA also said, "the alarming escalation in desperate forms of protest, including self-immolations, in Tibetan areas, is a clear judgment made by the Tibetan people of China's sixty years rule of Tibet."
"Since 2009, over 121 Tibetans have set themselves on fire to protest against the Chinese government's continued occupation of Tibet. The self-immolators have called for freedom for Tibetans and the return of His Holiness the Dalai Lama to Tibet," the statement said.
Responding to the white paper issued by China's State Council on Oct. 22, CTA stated "it is clear that economic and material development have failed Tibetans in their struggle to survive as a people with a distinct culture."
The statement adds, "in fact, the latest white paper is an attempt to cover up the darkest period experienced by the Tibetan people after China's invasion of Tibet. No less a figure than Hu Yaobang, the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, who visited Lhasa in 1980, apologized to the Tibetan people and said the conditions in Tibet were worse than pre-1959 Tibet."
"The late Panchen Lama, said in 1989, a few days before his untimely death, that China's rule in Tibet brought greater suffering than benefit for the Tibetan people. Over 1.2 million Tibetans died as a direct result of Chinese communist rule and more than 6,000 monasteries were razed to the ground," the CTA press statement further added.
"Interestingly, no other minorities in China have been the object of so many white papers. In light of growing public awareness and sympathy for the Tibetan cause, China is constantly challenged to justify the legitimacy of its presence in Tibet.," the statement concluded.
The response came after a new "Wite Paper"claimed Tibetan people are "happy and healthy" and China has no intention of altering its "correct" policies in the restive region of Tibet as it has brought unprecedented achievements.
"Tibetan culture has been well preserved and developed, and freedom of religious belief has been respected and protected," the white paper said, adding "the study and use of the Tibetan language and script are protected by law in China, and bilingual education, with Tibetan as the principal language".
"The Dalai Lama and his clique are conducting separatist activities for a long time to sabotage Tibet's development and stability, and it aims to "overthrow the socialist system and the system of regional ethnic autonomy that is practiced in Tibet," Xinhua reported citing the white paper.
The new document further attempts to cover up China's inhuman and brutal treatment of the Tibetan people under the names of "development success". "The gross regional product (GRP) of Tibet Autonomous Region has rocketed from 129 million yuan (21 million U.S. dollars) in 1951 to 70.1 billion yuan last year. The increase marked annual growth of 8.5 percent on average and the region's per capita GRP reached 22,900 yuan," says the document.
