Dharamsala, India — Today, Ranking Member Gregory W. Meeks delivered remarks to the Central Tibetan Administration in Dharamshala, India. His remarks, as delivered, can be read below: 

Tashi delek! It is great to be here with all of you. And I'm proud to be here today with my lovely wife, Simone. I want to thank the Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Michael McCaul, for leading this delegation. And it's especially an honor and a privilege to be here with someone that you all know and admire for her dedication and her commitment to stand with you, Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi. I would be remiss if I did not also recognize an individual who is known in the United States Congress as an individual who's focused on human rights here and everywhere around the world, and the sponsor of this bill, Jim McGovern, as well as all of my colleagues who have joined because of their commitment to you.  

Some have asked me: Why did I make this trip? And I can answer: in the words of Doctor Martin Luther King Jr., "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." Our voices have to be raised. 

I had the distinct honor to meet His Holiness the Dalai Lama earlier this morning. It is something that I will forever cherish. His wisdom, his optimism in the face of darkness is something from which I will take back and learn and keep for the rest of my life. 

And so, I'm here as the Ranking Member of the Foreign Affairs Committee. I'm here with a bipartisan delegation to let you all know that in the United States Congress, we are all together, and we are paying attention, and our support for Tibetan people is unwavering. 

I represent a borough in New York City called Queens, which is the home of the majority of Tibetan Americans in the United States of America. In fact, in Jackson Heights, Queens, "momos" are a household word. They are so popular that if you ask a New Yorker where they come from, they may tell you, Queens. Now, I know that across the United States, there are scores of Tibetan Americans and friends of Tibet working every day to ensure that your dream for a better day remains alive. 

All of us, every single one of us, are deeply concerned by Beijing's growing campaign of repression against Tibetans in the PRC. We know that Beijing is separating Tibetan children. Children like the children that is before us, from their families, through its state-run boarding schools. We know that Beijing is forcibly relocating entire communities under the guise of economic development. 

We know that it is targeting and imprisoning hundreds of Tibetan activists, writers, artists, teachers, and clergy for simply exercising their fundamental freedoms. And we know that it is trying to co-opt and control Tibetan Buddhism, even as it restricts freedom of religion across the Tibet Autonomous Region and other Tibetan areas. So, we are all here to call on the government of Beijing to immediately stop its countless abuses of Tibetan human rights. 

It is time for Beijing to reengage in dialogue without preconditions, with His Holiness and his representatives, to reach a negotiated resolution that leads to meaningful autonomy for the Tibetan people. 

This is why I was very proud to work with Representative McGovern, and Chairman McCaul, and the State Department to pass "the Promoting a Resolution to the Tibet-China Dispute Act," which passed through both chambers of Congress last week in a bipartisan manner. 

So, I want to end by recalling the words of the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr., who reminded us that "the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice." That famous pronouncement has always been a driving source of hope for me, and my own experience has also demonstrated it to me. My own family suffered first by slavery, and then Jim Crow and segregation. Yet, I stand here before all of you today as the first African American Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, now Ranking Member.  

And so, this is a special day, June 19th, a very special and historic day for me, because in 1865, African Americans who had been enslaved—the last one in Texas—were notified that they no longer were an enslaved people. They were a free people. And that's why this day is so important. Because I have hope for the Tibetan people.  

I know that you will all persevere for a better tomorrow for your children and your children's children. You will persevere so that you can speak your own language, so that you can pass on the beautiful customs that I have been privileged to see today. And I look forward to the day when we can all say that Tibetans are free at last, free to return to their homeland of Tibet, free to practice their own culture, free to live their freedom, free to be who they are and free to live their lives in dignity, and peace, and freedom, and justice for all of Tibetan people and for all the world. 

God bless you all.  

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