China holds major meet on Tibet's development strategies

Around 100 delegates from around the world, including from India, today took part in a key meet on Tibet and discussed development strategies for the strategically vital Himalayan region.
The two-day 'Fourth Forum on the Development of Tibet' is being held in Tibet's provincial capital Lhasa. The forum seeks to gather opportunities and suggestions for the remote region's future including the protection of Tibetan culture and environment.
Delegates from Britain, India, the US and other countries would pool collective experience to discuss development strategies for the region, China's state-run Xinhua news agency reported.
In his letter to the conference, Yu Zhengsheng, chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) said Tibet was largely isolated from the modern world until the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949.

"Since then the region has focused on development that meets the universal needs of human society and takes root in Chinese reality," he said.
"With its unique geographic location, natural environment and cultural tradition, Tibet has to follow a sustainable development pattern," he said.

Praising Tibet's rapid development, noted Indian journalist N Ram said it is in China's national interest to find a permanent solution to end the Dalai Lama-led "independence for Tibet campaign".
"The rapid and sustainable development of the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), within the socialist system, in a way that benefits the three million people of the region is one of China's strategic objectives," Ram, Chairman and Publisher of The Hindu Group of Newspapers, said.

"As a result of this development, Tibet's interaction and integration with the rest of China has deepened and its isolation from the rest of the world has decisively been ended," he said.
"Tibet's status as an integral part of the People's Republic of China is not disputed by a single country in the world; and no country accords legal recognition to the Dalai Lama's so-called 'government-in-exile' based in Dharamsala, India," Ram said.
"Nevertheless, finding a permanent solution in Tibet through a negotiated end to the Dalai Lama-led 'independence for Tibet' campaign and activities is clearly in China's national interest and therefore an important political objective," he said and referred to nine rounds of talks held between Chinese government and the Dalai Lama representatives.

About the future of the 1.50 lakh Tibetans living in self-exile abroad, Ram said while political solution remained political objective for the ruling Communist Party of China and Chinese government, "they can afford to take the really long view of the problem".
"They can wait for a comprehensive solution as long as it takes," he said.