Tuesday, June 19, 2007

Does Mongolia support Tibet as independent state?

Phayul.com reported on June 18 that a "historic" resolution accepting Tibet as an independent state was passed at the Asia - Pacific Committee Meeting of the International Union of Socialist Youth (IUSY), which was recently held in Ulaanbaatar, capital city of Mongolia, a country of predominantly Tibetan Buddhists.

Phayul said that the resolution accepted Tibet as an independent State and condemned the illegal occupation of Tibet.
The meeting, which was held from June 8 to 10, 2007, was hosted in the in the Official Meeting hall of Mongolian Ministry of Foreign Affairs Building in Ulaanbaatar.
The report said Mongolian to state officials attended the opening session of the meeting, including the host country's Minister of Foreign Affairs and deputy Speaker of Parliament, and other members of parliament.

I believe that Mongolia today supports state concept of Tibet as it is an inseperable part of People's Republic of China, however Mongolia and Tibet have deep historic cultural and religious ties dated back to over centuries. Maybe the meeting had no government links, but government and parliament delegation attended and it was hosted at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
I wonder how would Chinese embassy react to this.

The 14th Dalai Lama visited Mongolia several times in the past. Everytime he comes, MFA releases something official statement saying this visit is done by religious channel and the guest will not be engaged in any political activities. And, everytime he comes, China expresses objections by closing its railway or air links.
A five-point resolution on Tibet was then passed unanimously except, the resolution number (IV), which was objected only by the ethnic Han Chinese, Mr. Anthony Loke.

In the afternoon session of the second day, an open discussion on ‘China and engaging with the Chinese Communist Youth Organization’ was tabled. From the discussion, almost every representative objected to the idea of including China as a member of IUSY, including the chairperson himself Mr. Anthony.

During and after the meeting, the Tibetan representative met academicians from Mongolian Buddhist University and other influential personalities of the country to press them on the need to support the cause of Tibetan freedom struggle and to further relations between the youths of Mongolia and Tibetans in exile.
Following are the five points of the resolution on Tibet passed by the IUSY Asia-Pacific meeting:
1. To accept Tibet as an independent State and condemn the illegal occupation of Tibet.

2. To stop the demographic transformation policy of China which results in the large influx of Chinese into Tibet particularly after the Gormo – Lhasa Railway network.

3. To call upon the United Nations to resume the debate based on its resolution passed in 1959, 1961 and 1965 on Tibet.

4. To pressurize for the boycott of 2008 Beijing Olympic as China continue genocide in Tibet and pursue it’s imperialist ambitions threatening peace in Asia and the world at large.

5. To help restore human rights in Tibet and support the freedom movement of Tibetan people and to put pressure on China for the unconditional release of all political prisoners in Tibet including Panchen Lama and Tulku Tenzin Delek.
In 1913, Tibet and Mongolia signed a treaty proclaiming mutual recognition and their independence from China in Urga (now Ulaanbaatar).

Wikipedia said:
After the fall of the Qing Dynasty in 1911, both Tibet and Mongolia had declared their independence under lamaist heads of states, and both had had no success in gaining official recognition from either the Republic of China or foreign powers. In the treaty, Mongolia and Tibet declared mutual recognition and allegiance.

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