I. whereas the People’s Republic of China, along with 142 other countries, voted to adopt the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples on 13 September 2007, Article 14 of which states that ‘indigenous peoples have the right to establish and control their educational systems and institutions providing education in their own languages, in a manner appropriate to their cultural methods of teaching and learning’, J. whereas, owing to the dominance of the Chinese language, there is growing anxiety over job prospects among graduate students in Tibetan areas as, according to the petition signed by teachers and students, most Tibetan students have never been in a Chinese-language environment and therefore are not able to communicate in Chinese, 1. Condemns the increased crackdown on the exercise of the cultural, linguistic, religious and other fundamental freedoms of Tibetans, and stresses the need to preserve and protect the distinct cultural, religious and national identity of the six million Tibetan people and to address concerns about the repression and marginalisation of the Tibetan language, which underpins Tibetan identity; 2. Notes the concerns about the attempts to devalue the Tibetan language, and stresses the fact that if there is to be successful bilingual education, Tibetan must be the domestic language; 3. Calls on the Chinese authorities to implement Article 4 of the Constitution of the People’s Republic of China’s and Article 10 of the Law on Regional National autonomy which guarantee ‘the freedom of all nationalities to use and develop their own spoken and written languages’; 4. Urges the Chinese authorities to support a genuine policy of bilingualism, whereby all subjects, including maths and science, are allowed to be taught in the Tibetan language, teaching of the Chinese language is strengthened, and local authorities and communities are empowered to make decisions on the language of instruction; 5. Considers that every ethnic minority has the right to preserve its own language and writings; takes the view that a fair bilingual education system will contribute to better cooperation and understanding when Tibetan people learn Chinese, with Han people living in Tibetan areas at the same time being encouraged to learn the Tibetan language; 6. Stresses that, with the introduction of Chinese as the primary language of instruction, the quality of education for the vast majority of middle-school Tibetan students would suffer significantly, and that school subjects should therefore, as is most appropriate, only be taught in the Tibetan mother tongue; 7. Calls on the Chinese authorities to make every effort to lessen the linguistic and cultural disadvantages faced by Tibetans in urban employment, albeit in ways that do not undermine Tibetan language and culture; 8. Calls on the European Commission, the HR/VP and the Member States to urge the Chinese Government to ensure, firstly, that the right of peaceful expression by students is respected and that the relevant authorities address their grievances substantively and appropriately, and, secondly, that the 2002 ‘Regulations on the Study, Use and Development of the Tibetan Language’ are properly implemented, in accordance with the Law of Regional Ethnic Autonomy;