Sawt Falasteen - Exiled Tibetans elect government in vote condemned by China

The India-based Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) -- condemned by China as "nothing but a separatist political group" -- is a key institution for the exiles, especially after the Dalai Lama handed over political power in 2011.

"Our votes matter," said Tenzin Tsering, 19, a first-time voter, waiting to cast his ballot to push for greater youth representation.

"We need voices that reflect where our community is going, not just where it has been", he said, speaking in Bylakuppe in India's southern state of Karnataka, one of the largest Tibetan communities outside the Himalayan plateau.

Polling is due to take place in 27 countries -- but not China.

The 91,000 registered voters including Buddhist monks in the high Himalayas, political exiles in South Asia's megacities and refugees in Australia, Europe and North America.

The 90-year-old Dalai Lama, based in India since fleeing the Tibetan capital Lhasa after Chinese troops crushed an uprising in 1959, insists he has many more years to live.

But supporters of the Nobel Peace Prize laureate are acutely aware that self-declared atheist and Communist China said last year that it must approve the Buddhist leader's eventual successor.

The Dalai Lama says only his India-based office has that right.

Tibetan Buddhists believe he is the 14th reincarnation of a spiritual leader first born in 1391.

The five-year parliament, which sits twice a year, has 45 members from across the world: 30 representing three traditional provinces, 10 representing five religious traditions, and five representing the diaspora.

Headquartered in Dharamsala in northern India, it functions as a representative body for an estimated 150,000 Tibetans living in exile worldwide.

The government's "sikyong", or leader, Penpa Tsering, was elected for a second term on February 1, after taking 61 percent in the preliminary round -- a high enough threshold to win outright.

Tsering, like the government, does not seek full independence for Tibet, in line with the Dalai Lama's long-standing "Middle Way" policy seeking autonomy.

G.AbuGhazaleh--SF-PST