The alarmingly high amount of deaths has come from severe beatings in prison, and the killings of those caught trying to flee the country, those trying to demonstrate when foreign dignitaries have been given Chinese led tours of Tibet, and for those who broke the incredibly stringent laws that operate in Tibet, when mere torture and beatings have been deemed insufficient punishments. These laws include the denial of freedom of expression, freedom to propagate and practice religion, and the freedom to preserve their distinct culture and religion.

Religion is of course central to the Tibetan problem, as Tibetan culture is, essentially, the practice of Buddhism. According to Schwartz, "any display of religion was [in the 1960's] prohibited, punishable by beatings and imprisonment, and all religious objects were confiscated and destroyed ... [but in the year 2000] religion is still seen as an obstacle to the goal of absorbing Tibet into China."

Of the hundreds of Tibetan political prisoners alive today, the vast majority are monks and nuns. During Chinese rule, around 6,000 monasteries have been destroyed. Intrinsically linked to this atheistic absorption, Chinese has become the official language of Tibet, and Chinese migration into Tibet has become so large that in most areas there are now more Chinese than native Tibetans.

Yet the most painful legislation for Tibetans has been the forced denouncement of their chosen spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, who fled the country following the National Uprising. The Dalai Lama, now famous internationally for his peace preaching, is so important to modern Tibet that the Chinese have introduced the "Patriotic Education Campaign" that operates in monasteries. Involving armed police hovering over potential monks and nuns, they are ready to inflict pain on them if ambiguous questions about Tibetan history and the Dalia Lama are answered "incorrectly". The Dalai Lama has therefore resorted to publicly asking all religious Tibetans to denounce him to avoid the penalties. Hence, the more liberal attitude to religion in Tibet claimed by the Chinese after Chairman Mao's legacy is in truth nothing less than a continuation of his policies. The Dalai Lama made this point on March 10th, saying that nowadays there is an "atmosphere of intimidation reminiscent of the Cultural Revolution. It is cultural genocide."

Thanks largely to the Dalai Lama, Tibet has remained so peaceful in the face of Chinese oppressive intimidation, that anything like the imposition of the poll tax would probably go unnoticed in Tibet. According to him, "the practice of tolerance is essential ... an enemy is indispensable." Tibetans have rarely resorted to anything more than peaceful demonstrations and hunger strikes, which have received the same punishment that any violent reaction would have provoked. This is in the face of the forced abortion and sterilisation of Tibetan women. The abduction and disappearance of the chosen 6 year old Panchen Lama in 1996 and subsequent replacement by a Chinese backed ruler. The destruction of the Tibetan environment has included deforestation, strip-mining of mineral and uranium deposits, nuclear testing and toxic and nuclear waste dumped, the displacement of people, the famines of the early 1960's that killed thousands, the draining of lakes and the endangerment of wildlife, (to eradicate what Mao Zedong referred to as "parasitic and unnecessary animals").

Yet despite the courage of Tibet, Dr. Melvyn Goldstein, an expert on China and anthropology Professor at Case Western Reserve University is pessimistic about the future. "Tibet had always remained the exclusive home of a people, but this is now being lost. The triumphs won by the Dalai Lama's international campaign look more and more like Pyrrhic victories."

This may not necessarily be the case, despite China's re-education program, recent generations of Tibetans, brought up on atheistic rule, are still enthusiastic about religion. Most of the political prisoners are under 30 years of age, including the world's youngest known prisoner, a ten year old boy, and were mainly arrested either for praying publicly or for supporting the Dalai Lama.

What is China's view on this? An official Chinese web site, http://china-window.com/Area/Xizang/part1/index.htm amongst many one- sided claims, fails to mention the famine of the 1960's in China's history of Tibet. It also says the Government, during the National Uprising, was "responding to the true will of the Tibetan people [and] implemented democratic reform."

Very few Western politicians, historians and social commentators would agree with this, yet they also have a long history of distorting facts against countries that they have an ideological disagreement with. The fact that China has remained aloof whilst Western demands for information have been called for, does not equate to human rights abuses. But reliable evidence is overwhelming. MO Li Hua, a Chinese woman jailed for three years in the early 1990's for speaking out against her country, told the Worldview International Foundation how the average Chinese citizen feels about Tibet. She said, "I grew up thinking that China really liberated Tibet. We actually believed that the Chinese Government was helping the Tibetans to be free from what the Beijing leadership calls serfdom. But when we had access to independent information on what actually transpired, we could not believe how the Government indoctrinated us into believing its propaganda on Tibet."

Suppression of culturally identity always seems a particularly malicious crime, because cultural identity in its most fervent form, that is irrational nationalism, not only espouses the same kind of intolerance that Chinese-style oppression breeds, but is born out of the same sense of injustice that in Tibet is very real. That is, Chinese occupation of Tibet is only preventing the problems that the occupation has caused. This brings us back to why 1989 is so important. 1989 saw the Dalai Lama win the Nobel Peace Prize for his calls for peaceful resistance and a compromise, whereby Tibet would accept Chinese sovereignty if they were allowed political autonomy. 1989 also saw China's response which was the declaration of martial law on Tibet for one year. If any year could highlight the struggles of the Tibetan people, it is 1989.

Oppression is of course relative. Just because those around the world shout it when the reality is less serious than modern Tibet, it is not necessarily any less real. Nor should the case of Tibet be used to demonstrate the shortcomings of cultural diversity. What it should do is remind the world that whilst 1989 made the world very different, perhaps happier, some places slipped through the net.