A number of years ago, the numerous scattered tribes on the Tibet Plateau in southwestern China became unified to form the Tibetan race.

In the 13th century, Tibet was officially incorporated into the Yuan Dynasty of China. In 1264, Emperor Qubilai set the High Pacification Commissioner’s Office to directly take charge of military and civil affairs in Tibet. In 1348, the Ming Dynasty following Yuan inherited sovereignty over Tibet.

In 1644, the Qing Dynasty replaced Ming and strengthened the relationship between Tibet and the central government. In 1653 and 1713, the Qing emperors conferred honorific titles to the fifth Dalai Lama and the fifth Bainqen Lama, respectively, henceforth officially establishing the titles of the Dalai Lama and the Bainqen Erdeni and their political and religious status in Tibet. Later, Beijing created the position of Tibet High Commissioner. The commissioners, according to law, had an equal footing with the Dalai Lama and the Bainqen Erdeni.

In 1911, the Republic of China was founded and continued to hold sovereignty in Tibet. The 13th Dalai Lama and ninth Bainqen Erdeni declared that Tibet was part of China several times during that period.

Thus, for more than 700 years, China has continuously exercised sovereignty over Tibet, and Tibet has never been an independent state. Now, millions of files in both Chinese and Tibetan that record historical facts of the more than seven centuries are archived in Beijing and Lhasa.

According to international law, the word “invasion” is definitely wrong to describe the relationship between China and Tibet, because it is a central-local relationship, rather than a nation-nation relationship.

No government of any country in the world has ever recognized Tibet as an independent state. British Foreign Secretary Lord Lansdowne, in a formal instruction he sent out in 1904, called Tibet “a province of the Chinese Empire.” Likewise, in his speech at the Lok Sabba in 1954, Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru said, “Over the past several hundred years, as far as I know, at no time has any foreign country denied China’s sovereignty over Tibet.”

To most of us, Tibet recalls a heaven of mystery and charm. The Himalayas, mirror-like lakes, the magnificent Potala Palace, and the pure sky constitute a picture of Shangri-La. But that’s not the complete story of Tibet before the 1950s. Before the Democratic Reform of 1959, Tibet had long been a serfdom society under the despotic political-religious rule of lamas and nobles, a society that was darker and crueler than the European serfdom of the Middle Ages.

At that time, more than 90 percent of the Tibetan population was made up of serfs. They had no land or freedom, and their survival depended on estate holder’s manors. Normally, the serf owners had penitentiaries or private prisons on their manorial grounds, as did large monasteries.

Punishments were extremely savage and cruel, including gouging out eyes, cutting off ears, hands and feet, pulling out tendons and throwing people into water.

Before the 1950s, Tibet was one of the regions witnessing the most serious violations of human rights in the world.

The fifth Dalai Lama once issued the order, “Commoners of Lhari Ziba listen to my order: … I have authorized Lhari Ziba to chop off your hands and feet, gouge out your eyes, and beat and kill you if you again attempt to look for freedom and comfort.” This order was reiterated on many occasions by his successors in power.

After 1959, the central government conducted the Democratic Reform in Tibet and abolished the extremely decadent and dark serfdom. One million serfs and slaves have been emancipated since then.

Before the 1950s, there were no schools in the modern sense. Now, every Tibetan has the equal right of receiving an education.

All the study costs of Tibetan students, from primary school to university, are covered by the government.

From 1959 to the present, the average life span has increased from 36 years to 67 years, and the death rate of infants has decreased from 20 percent to 0.661 percent. The population in 1953, according to the census done by the local government headed by the Dalai Lama, was 1 million. Now there are 2.6 million people living in Tibet, and 92 percent of them are ethnic Tibetans. Since 1970, the natural population growth rate of Tibet has been above the average national level.

The world still knows very little about real developments in this region. Those who once deprived the Tibetans of all personal freedom now shout that the human rights of the people there are being deprived. Rumors, distortion and misleading information all combine to form a layer of mist enveloping the region.