In 1913, the Dalai Lama issued a proclamation stating that the relationship between the Chinese emperor & Tibet "had been that of patron and priest and had not been based on the subordination of one to the other."

"We are a small, religious, and independent nation," the proclamation continued. For the next 36 years, Tibet enjoyed de facto independence. Tibet issued its own postage stamps from 1912 on.

In October 1950, the People's Liberation Army invaded Tibet, defeating the Tibetan army. In 1951, Tibetan representatives participated in negotiations in Beijing with the Chinese government. This resulted in a 17 Point Agreement which formalised China's sovereignty over Tibet. This was regarded as being a Chinese-imposed treaty.

In 1959, China's ongoing violations of the 17 Point Agreement led to the "Lhasa Uprising." Full-scale resistance spread throughout Tibet. Fearing capture of the Dalai Lama, unarmed Tibetans surrounded his residence, and the Dalai Lama fled to India.

In 2009, to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the 1959 uprising, Friends of Tibet in New Zealand applied to the NZ Post Office to have personalized stamps made in this design, showing the Potala Palace in Lhasa (seat of the Tibet Civil Service in independent days, and now turned into a museum by the occupiers) with the Tibetan flag. NZ Post rejected the design, presumably because of the word "Tibet" being used. So this is the unadopted essay, which has now been made into minisheets with a Tibet website, http://www.tibet.org.

Later in 2009, we were successful in getting two Tibet stamps published by NZ Post: 50c and $1. Those have just the Tibet flag and the dates "1959 - 2009" on them.

The wording in the margin of this essay minisheet is:

These stamps remember the 50th anniversary of the Tibet Uprising against the illegal Chinese occupation of their country. The uprising followed repeated Chinese violations of the 1951 "17 Point Agreement" which China forced on Tibet.

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This auction is for a minisheet of ten stamps.