Geneva, 13 Nov. 2009 Yong Zhou, Researcher and Director of China Auton-omy Program, NCHR., Faculty of Law, University of Oslo In relation to the concrete steps to advance minority political participation and to build the capacity of minorities to participate effectively, I would like to highlight three elemenis from our experience on studying minority rights in China and presenting policy/law recommendations. 1. International cooperation The Beijing-Oslo Recommendations is the result of the joint deliberations among experts mainly from China and Norway. This cooperation is organized by the Research Centre for Ethnic Issues in China and the Norwegian Centre for Human Rights during the last four years. The Sino-Norwegian human rights dialogue and long-term institutional research cooperation establish the basis for experts working together constructively in their personal capacity to present this recommendations. Chinese experts with minority origin have actively participated in and contributed to this work. 2. Recommendations as a "menu" based on comparative studies of states' practices This Recommendations aims to present a "menu", i.e. a set of alternatives for implementing human rights standards in various political, social and cultural context of states to law makers, administrators, NGOs and scholars as a source of inspiration and as a reference to be used in the process of law/policy making. 3. Making the Recommendations as a living document for further experiment In response to the common challenges in different countries, experts have responsibility and can serve as social engineers to explore more concert alternatives for implementing general principles on effective participation to fit the special needs of linguistic minority individuals and communities. This knowledge can facilitate the negotiations among all stakeholders in this field. The exploration of existing good practices and new mechanism is an on going process. Many countries in the world like China have enormous cultural and regional diversities and very rich practices in policy/law. We would like to broaden our empirical studies in this field and to join the efforts with, the UN independent expert on minority issues to make all our recommendations as living documents, to be continuously discussed, tested and to transfer those good ideas from paper into real practices.