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Dalai Lama appeals for support from international community

  • Jo Siedlecka

Source: ICN/VIS

The Dalai Lama has called for an investigation into whether cultural genocide, intentional or not, is taking place taking place in Tibet, following China's violent clampdown on Tibetan demonstrators in the region,

The country's exiled spiritual leader said China was relying on force to achieve peace and that the international community had the "moral responsibility" to remind China to be a good host for the Olympic Games. However, the Dalai Lama said he did not think the Olympics should be called off and he said China deserved to host the Games.

"The Tibetan nation is facing serious danger. Whether China's government admits or not, there is a problem," the Dalai Lama said. "The situation reminds me of the uprising in 1959 when I was forced to flee into exile. It has become really very, very tense. And today I had the same experience as in 1959 after March 10," he said.

He said that with both sides being "determined", the end result will be more killing and more suffering. Monks first took to the streets of Tibet last Monday to mark the 49th anniversary of an earlier uprising, and protests soon spread to adjoining regions inhabited by pockets of Tibetans.

Chinese soldiers are reported to be making house-to-house searches throughout Lhasa and have given the demonstrators until midnight tomorrow to give themselves up. China reports that ten people have been killed. The Tibetans claim more than a hundred have died.

A Nobel Peace Prize winner, the Dalai Lama has devoted his life to human rights and interfaith dialogue. He met with Pope Paul VI at the Vatican in 1973. He met with Pope John Paul II in 1980 and also later in 1982, 1986, 1988, 1990, and 2003.

In 1990, he met in Dharamsala with a delegation of Jewish teachers for an extensive interfaith dialogue. He has since visited Israel three times and met in 2006 with the Chief Rabbi of Israel.

In 2006, he met privately with Pope Benedict XVI. He has also met the Archbishop of Canterbury, the late Dr Robert Runcie, and other leaders of the Anglican Church in London, as well as senior Eastern Orthodox Church, Muslim, Hindu, Jewish, and Sikh officials. Since China invaded Tibet in 1951, they have conducted a policy of destroying monasteries and suppressing the Buddhist. religion.

In China itself, all religions, including Buddhists, Muslims, indigenous Falan Gong practitioners and Christians of all denominations are discouraged and often persecuted. On Good Friday, the Stations of the Cross at the Coliseum in Rome will be led by Chinese Cardinal Joseph Zen. The Cardinal has asked for prayers that he may be able to witness to the sufferings of Christians and all religious people in China.

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