LHASA, March 4 (Xinhuanet) -- Since establishment of China's Tibet Autonomous Region in 1965, local Tibetans have seen many rights endowed to them through autonomous regional legislation.

    "In the past 40 years, a total of 232 laws and regulations havebeen enacted and issued by the people's congress and its standing committee of the Tibet Autonomous Region," said Basang Norbu, Chairman of the Legislative Affairs Committee of the regional people's congress.

    Those regulations and laws cover a variety of fields including politics, economics, culture and education. They deal with culturerelics preservation, petitions, Tibetan language learning, usage and development, and maintaining the unity of the country.

    "The implementation of those local laws and regulations have been acting as an important legal guarantee in safeguarding the special rights of the Tibetan People," said Basang Norbu.

    According to Basang Norbu, the regional people's congress has also made some changes to regulations and rules issued by the state government for rights and interests of the local Tibetans.

    For example, some traditional festivals of the Tibetans such asthe Tibetan New Year and the Shoton Festival have been recognized as the legal holidays in Tibet. Also the legal weekly working timein the autonomous region was shortened to 35 hours, five hours shorter than the national standard, because of the special naturaland geographic factors of the region, said Basang Norbu.

    Moreover, considering the ethnic traditions of the local Tibetans, an adaptation to the Marriage Law of the People's Republic of China was enacted by the standing committee of the regional people's congress. According to the adaptation law, the legal age for marriage of the Tibetan women and men were 18 and 20years old respectively, two years younger than that of the generallegal age of the Chinese.

    According to the Constitution and laws of China, the regional people's congress enjoys not only the legislation power of its general provincial counterparts, but also the special power to enact rules or regulations according to the special characteristics of the local ethnic people, said Basang Norbu. Enditem