The US Congressional-Executive Commission on China has released its 2010 Annual Report on human rights and the rule of law in China, along with a list of over 1,450 political prisoners currently detained or imprisoned in China.

The full text of this year's report is available on the Commission's Web site.

The Committee concluded that “human rights conditions in China over the last year have deteriorated."

The report outlines the following concerns in Tibet

•  The Chinese government and Communist Party continue to seek to isolate the Dalai Lama internationally and diminish or end his international influence.

• The ninth round of dialogue between the representatives of the Dalai Lama and the Chinese government concluded in January 2010 without resulting in substantive progress.
  
  
• The government and Party created increasing restraints on the exercise of freedom of religion for Tibetan Buddhists.
  
  
• Government and Party economic development objectives for 2010 to 2020 principally focus on accelerating and strengthening a development model that subordinates respecting and protecting Tibetan culture to Party and government priorities.
  
  
• By the end of 2009, more than 1.33 million nomadic herders and farmers in the Tibet Autonomous Region (a figure equal to about half the TAR Tibetan population) will have been resettled.
  
  
• By 2020 officials plan for the mining industry share of TAR GDP to increase from about 3 percent currently to between 30 percent and 50 percent.
  
  
• Increased  punishment for Tibetans who attempt to share with other Tibetans information about
  incidents of repression and punishment.

TAKE ACTION!

Below are the recommendations of the Commission directed at the Members of the US Congress and Administration officials. You can write to your representative with the following requests.

Recommendations to Members of the U.S. Congress and Administration officials.

• Urge the Chinese government to engage in substantive dialogue with the Dalai Lama or his representatives Convey to the Chinese government the urgent importance of refraining from using legal measures to infringe upon and repress Tibetan Buddhists’ right to the freedom of religion.
• Request that the Chinese government follow up on the March 2010 statement by the Chairman of the TAR government that Gedun Choekyi Nyima, the Panchen Lama whom the Dalai Lama recognized in 1995, is living in the TAR as an  ‘‘ordinary citizen’’ along with his family.
• Encourage the Chinese government to maximize benefits to Tibetans by fully taking into account the views and preferences of Tibetans when planning infrastructure and natural resource development
  projects in Tibetan areas of China.
• Increase support for U.S. non-governmental organizations to develop programs that can assist Tibetans to increase their capacity to peacefully protect and develop their culture, language,
  and heritage;
  
• Continue to convey to the Chinese government the importance of honoring reference to the freedoms of speech, religion, association, and assembly in China’s Constitution, and refraining from using the security establishment, courts, and law to infringe upon and repress Tibetans’ exercise of such rights.
  
• Continue to raise in meetings and correspondence with Chinese officials the cases of Tibetans who are imprisoned as punishment for the peaceful exercise of human rights.