Legal Autonomy of Tibet: A Chinese Lawyer's Perspective

Abstract

The conflict happened on the high plateau of Tibet in the spring of 2008 has drawn much attention of the world on the Tibet issue. The politics-oriented media cover of some foreign countries sharply contradictory to that of China makes it very difficult for ordinary Chinese people to know the actual state of affairs and also creates quite unfriendly and detrimental atmosphere for the peaceful solution of this issue in short time. Open and impartial research and discussion on this issue is necessary and helpful to the final resolution. The Tibet “Government-in-exile” has openly stated its stance and opinions on the autonomy of Tibet, while the Chinese Central Government insists that it is not going to negotiate any’Tibet issue’ with the 14th Dalai Lama and his followers except for Dalai Lama’ personal future. Since the position of the Central Government on Tibet is very tough, it seems that any autonomy in Tibet beyond the current Chinese law on regional autonomy in ethnic areas is impossible. This paper is dedicated to probing the history and analyzing the current situation of the autonomy of Tibet, and exploring possibilities of changing the current autonomy. Part II introduces the China’s administration over Tibet before 1950 when Tibet enjoyed great autonomy. Part III comments on the current system of regional autonomy in Tibet. Part IV discusses possible changes to the current autonomy in Tibet. Due to the big difference between the Central Government of China and the Tibet Government-in-exile, the author concludes that it needs a longway to go to the final solution of the Tibet issue. A Chinese Lawyers Persepective on Tibet 1