March 4, 1997

News Update from Tibet Bureau for UN Affairs, Geneva - Submitted by Office of Tibet NY

Contact: Ngawang Drakmargyapon

Tibet Bureau for UN Affairs

Tel. 41-22-738-7940

Rome/Geneva, 4 March - During a meeting of the Italian Parliamentarians in Rome last week, 100 members of the Italian Senate and the Chamber of Deputies, the two houses of the Italian Parliament, announced the formation of an Italian Parliamentary Group on Tibet ("Intergruppo Parlamentare Di Impegno a Favore Del Popolo Tibetano"). Mrs. Chungdak D. Koren, Representative of H. H. the Dalai Lama for Central and Southern Europe Affairs, was present during the announcement in Rome, on 27 February at the Italian Parliament.

"The Tibetan Government-in-Exile welcomes this positive message from the people of Italy to the cause of Tibet," said Mrs. Koren. In May, 1996, His Holiness the Dalai Lama was officially received at the Italian Parliament by Mr. Luciano Violante, the President of the Chamber of Deputies, and other political leaders. This is the third such group in Tibet in central and southern Europe, where Swiss and German parliamentarians have formed groups on Tibet in their Parliaments.

Last July, supporters of Tibet in the Chamber of Deputies had introduced a strongly-worded resolution condemning China for "serious and systematic violations of human rights in Tibet" and inviting the Italian Government to declare its support "for the efforts made by the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan Government in Exile to restore, in a peaceful manner, the cultural and religious freedom of the Tibetan people, as well as its right to self-determination." The Parliamentary Group on Tibet, representing all political parties in Italy, is now expected to seek the adoption of the resolution in the Chamber of Deputies this year.

Earlier initiatives by the Italian Parliament on Tibet came through a resolution adopted by the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Chamber of Deputies on 12 April, 1989, where it urged the Italian Government to "Undertake any possible action in order to put an end to human rights violations and environmental damages and to come as soon as possible to a pacific solution to the Tibetan problem". In September, 1995, parliamentarians from eight political parties in Italy and Foreign Affairs Committee received Prof. Samdhong Rinpoche, Chairman of the Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile.