For the past 49 years, Tibet has been under the

increasingly repressive rule of its neighbour China. The

countryside is being fenced in and stripped of trees

and minerals; cities and towns are being deliberately

flooded with Chinese settlers; and the indigenous

Tibetans are finding themselves stripped of their rights,

culture and religious freedom. Their exiled leader the

Dalai Lama wants to find a compromise solution that

will enable the Tibetan and Chinese peoples to co-exist

peacefully, but until now Premier Wen Jiabao has

been unwilling to meet with him.