When President Hu Jintao was Communist Party secretary in Tibet in the late 1980s, he cracked down on an independence protest by Tibetans in Lhasa. About 130 people were killed and hundreds arrested. Now, surprisingly, it is Mr Hu to whom exiled Tibetans are looking to offer a deal on autonomy that would allow the Dalai Lama and others of their number to return home.
Many Tibetans in refugee settlements across the Indian sub-continent are betting on Mr Hu and the changes taking place in China for a resolution of the Tibet issue.
The focus is China's current economic and social overhaul. Having launched an astronaut into space, and with its preparations under way for the Olympic Games in Beijing in 2008, the country is aiming for superpower status. But it continues to face problems with territorial integrity. Despite the deployment of a reported 250,000 troops and economic growth in the Tibetan Autonomous Region, there still are fears of trouble - as shown by recent 'anti-terrorist' drills in Lhasa.
As shown this week during Premier Wen Jiabao's trip to the US and Canada - which coincided with International Human Rights Day on Wednesday - China's leaders are still dogged by the protests of the 'Free Tibet' lobby when they head abroad. The reception of the Dalai Lama by world heads of state continues to grate with the central government. And across the Taiwan Strait, the calls in Taipei for independence grow louder. It is against such a backdrop that the Tibetan exiles are hoping China's new leadership will demonstrate wisdom by embracing the Dalai Lama's non-violent 'middle way' approach. This calls for a degree of autonomy for Tibetans, respect for their culture and religion, and the opportunity for the return of the spiritual leader and the 130,000 exiles, all under the umbrella of the People's Republic of China.
Capitalising on cross-strait tensions, the Tibetans claim that what is good for Tibet is good for Taiwan, that if autonomy can be seen to work in the Land of Snows, the people of Taiwan can also be wooed back into the fold.
At the Tibetan 'exile government' headquarters at Dharamsala in India, there is cautious optimism that Mr Hu will be favourable to a deal on Tibet, half a century after the PLA 'peacefully liberated' the territory that China claims is historically part of the motherland. Tibetan prime minister in exile Samdhong Rinpoche said there had been progress from two visits by representatives of the Dalai Lama, in September 2002 and May this year, to China and Tibet. He said the visits were designed to open up dialogue with Beijing and break the silence that has reigned since 1993, when talks broke down. Samdhong Rinpoche, a respected monk who was democratically elected premier by the exile community in 2001, contrasted the reception Tibetan envoys received in the 1980s, when 'the Chinese just gave their position and were never ready to listen to our position. Then their attitude and behaviour was very rude and very one-sided'. Now they were listening, he said.