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September 9, 2025 marks the 60th anniversary of the founding of an entity labeled as “Tibet Autonomous Region” (TAR), a province-level administrative division in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) which encompasses merely roughly half of Tibet. While Chinese state media is striking a predictably upbeat tone on the anniversary, the reality is that Tibetans have little to celebrate.

“For our brothers and sisters in Tibet, the last sixty years have lurched from one calamity to another,” said International Campaign for Tibet President Tencho Gyatso. “Instead of forcing Tibetans to put on a performance of gratitude, China must change course and put the interests of the Tibetan people ahead of their own compulsive need for power and control.”

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The PRC’s invasion of Tibet, and subsequent illegal occupation, was accompanied by promises of regional autonomy, freedom of religious belief, the development of Tibet’s languages, and a clause stating that there would be no compulsion on the part of China’s government over Tibet.

These promises were immediately violated by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). After the Dalai Lama’s 1959 flight from Tibet all pretenses were discarded, and in 1965 the Chinese authorities unveiled the “Tibet Autonomous Region”. In the time since, no Tibetan has ever been appointed to rule the TAR as the Party Secretary; every single Party Secretary has been Chinese, a list which includes prominent human rights abusers such as Chen Quanguo (the architect of China’s mass internment campaign in East Turkestan/Xinjiang) and hyper-corrupt cadres such as Wu Yingjie (recently arrested and sentenced to accepting over ¥343 million in bribes).

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