2010 has been a busy year for Free Tibet.

In January, with the support of British actors Juliet Stevenson, Dominic West, David Threlfall and Alan Rickman we launched the next phase of our campaign to Stop Torture in Tibet. The actors all recorded testimonies of Tibetan survivors of torture for our website. By the end of 2010 the UK government had agreed to include torture in their human rights dialogue with China, one of the campaign’s key objectives.

On 10 March, the anniversary of the Tibetan National Uprising, Free Tibet supporters joined other Tibet support groups in a mass lobby of Parliament.

In April Free Tibet supporters marked the Panchen Lama’s 21^st birthday by lighting candles in Trafalgar Square in London, ensuring that the plight of this young man, who has been a political prisoner since the age of six, is not forgotten.

Free Tibet ran a General Election Campaign to build support for Tibet in the newly-elected Parliament. Over 200 candidates pledged to promote human rights in Tibet if they were elected, which many were. The number of MPs sitting in Parliament who are committed to strengthening UK policy to promote the rights of Tibetans in Tibet is thus steadily growing.

In July, we marked His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s 75^th birthday. Free Tibet teamed up with Archbishop Desmond Tutu to write an open letter, published in The Telegraph, highlighting restrictions on religious freedom in Tibet.

An ICM poll commissioned by Free Tibet in 2010 revealed that 74% of Britons believe that protecting human rights in Tibet is at least as important as good trade relations with China. 58% of British adults believe that Tibet should be independent, and only 3% believe Tibet should continue to be ruled by China.

In 2010, Free Tibet presented evidence to the United Nations – on human rights breaches incurred by the Chinese policy of nomadic resettlement - and to the Conservative Party Human Rights Commission on violations of religious freedom. We also presented briefing papers on the current situation in Tibet to the British Prime Minister, the Foreign Secretary’s office, the Minister of State with responsibility for relations with China, to the Foreign Office and to MPs.

In October, thousands of students protested in Tibet. First-hand information circulated by Free Tibet about the biggest protests since 2008 was cited by international media including the BBC, CNN, Financial Times, New York Times, the Guardian and the Independent, ensuring that these protests were not hidden from the world. By December the UK government had agreed to include minority language rights in their human rights dialogue with China in January 2011.

In Tibet the struggle continues as Tibetans are daily deprived of their basic rights and torture is still a reality. We had many successes in 2010 but now we look ahead to the work we will be doing for Tibetans in Tibet in 2011. I hope that you will support Free Tibet next year.