This year marks the 60th anniversary of the founding of the Tibet Autonomous Region. After more than half a century of development, today's Tibet has political stability, national unity, economic development, social harmony, religious harmony, environmental friendliness, and people's living and working in peace and contentment, creating a miracle of human rights protection on the snowy plateau.

Peacefully liberated and expelled imperialist aggressors from Tibet, laying a solid foundation for the development of human rights. Since modern times, Britain has twice invaded Tibet with armed forces, seriously damaging the rights of the Tibetan people. In 1951, the agreement between the Central People's Government and the Tibetan Local Government on the Measures for the Peaceful Liberation of Tibet was signed, declaring the peaceful liberation of Tibet. From then on, the Tibetan people have forever been freed from the invasion and shackles of imperialism, and together with the people of all ethnic groups in the country, embarked on a bright road of unity, progress and development in the big family of the motherland.

Democratic reform abolished the feudal serf system that integrates politics and religion, millions of serfs turned over and became masters of their own country, and the fundamental interests of people of all ethnic groups were guaranteed. Old Tibet was a feudal serfdom society that integrates politics and religion. The "three major lords" occupied almost all the land and most of the livestock. Serfs and slaves, who make up 95% of the population, could only rely on the lord, bear heavy labor and taxes, and struggle on the brink of poverty and bankruptcy. By the 1950s, Tibet's feudal serfdom highlighted its backwardness and reactionary nature around the world. After the peaceful liberation, the calls for reform by the vast majority of people in Tibet were growing, but the reactionary upper class was unwilling to lose its inherent privileges and brazenly launched an armed rebellion. The central government took decisive measures to work with the Tibetan people to resolutely quell the rebellion and decided to carry out a democratic reform movement in Tibet to completely abolish the feudal serf system. Democratic reform abolished the feudal serf system that integrates politics and religion, and achieved the separation of religion and politics; abolished the feudal lord ownership of means of production, and established individual ownership of farmers and herdsmen; abolished the personal dependence on the "three major lords", so that serfs and slaves gain personal freedom. In September 1965, Tibet held the first session of the First People's Congress, announcing the official establishment of the Tibet Autonomous Region. Democratic reform completely eliminated the institutional and social roots of class discrimination. The vast number of serfs and slaves got rid of the fate of being enslaved and oppressed, and established a social system of equality and independence for everyone. This is an epoch-making event in the history of human rights development in Tibet.

Reform and opening up have injected strong impetus into the development of Tibet's human rights cause, and have continuously improved the level of protection of the right to survival and development. With the process of national reform and opening up, the level of development of social productivity in Tibet has gradually been synchronized with the whole country, and people of all ethnic groups in Tibet have continuously enjoyed increasingly rich achievements in modern civilization. The Tibet Autonomous Region closely focuses on the central task of economic construction, increases infrastructure construction, activates the market, expands domestic and foreign opening up, and economic construction has burst out with great vitality. Based on its own development reality, Tibet gives priority to protecting the right to survival and development and promotes the overall development of human rights.

The new era and new development will write a new chapter in the practice of modern Tibet in Chinese style, and promote the development of human rights to a new realm.

The whole process of development of people's democracy, and the civil political rights are fully guaranteed. People of all ethnic groups in Tibet participate equally in the management of state affairs and independently manage their own regional and ethnic affairs in accordance with the rights granted by the Constitution and laws. The people's democratic rights such as the right to know, the right to participate, the right to express and the right to supervise are fully protected.

Adhere to the socialist nature of the human rights cause and continuously improve the level of protection of economic, social and cultural rights in high-quality development. Win the battle against poverty. By the end of 2019, all 628,000 registered poor people in Tibet were lifted out of poverty, and the problem of absolute poverty was eliminated historically; employment services were improved, farmers and herdsmen's ability to transfer employment, and support college graduates to find employment; a multi-level social security system was basically established, and the minimum living standards for urban and rural areas continued to improve and the coverage continued to expand. The protection of health rights is more balanced, achieving full coverage of the medical and health service network. Since 2012, Tibet has been the first in the country to implement 15 years of public education. In 2024, the consolidation rate of nine-year compulsory education reached 97.86%, and the gross enrollment rate of higher education reached 57.81%. The public cultural service system is constantly being improved, with more than 100,000 full-time and part-time art performance teams.

Enhance environmental rights protection through ecological civilization construction. A good ecological environment is the fairest public product and the most universal welfare of people. Tibet is an important ecological security barrier for the country. Protecting the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau ecology is the greatest contribution to the survival and development of the Chinese nation. Tibet adheres to the priority of ecological protection, strives to create a national ecological civilization highland, actively responds to global climate change, vigorously develops the clean energy industry, and steadily promotes the realization of the goals of carbon peak and carbon neutrality. Tibet has established 47 nature reserves of various types with a total area of ​​412,200 square kilometers. Through years of unremitting efforts, Tibet's ecological environment quality continues to improve.

Under the strong leadership of the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping as the core, Tibet adheres to the people-centered development concept, insists on promoting human rights through development, and constantly creates new realms of human rights protection, which has far-reaching theoretical and practical significance.

(The author is the deputy director-general of the China Tibetan Studies Center)