Tibetan spiritual leader Dalai Lama will visit Arunachal Pradesh next month as scheduled despite China’s warning it could harm Sino-Indian ties and peace in the border region between the neighbors.
During his April 4-13 visit, the Dalai Lama will meet his followers including federal Minister of State for Home Affairs Kiren Rijiju at Tawang monastery, the largest in India and the second largest in the world.
Rijiju represents the Arunachal West constituency, which covers the Tawang district.
Commenting on China’s “grave concern” over the Dalai Lama’s Arunachal visit, he said India’s interests came first for the federal government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang on Friday underlined the seriousness and sensitivity of Dalai Lama’s visit.
India should stick to its political commitments and consensus on the boundary question and refrain from providing a platform to Dalai Lama, Geng said.
His comments came after a former Chinese negotiator told a journal that the border dispute can be resolved if India accepted Beijing’s claim over Tawang.
Former Chinese diplomat Dai Bingguo said a solution to the border issue was within grasp if India and China responded to each other’s territorial concerns.
Tawang is a disputed territory. Even British colonialists who drew the disputed McMahon Line as the boundary between China and India viewed Tawang as part of China’s Tibet, Dai told China-India Dialogue magazine.
He said it was up to Indian and China now to correct the mistakes committed by colonialists.
Since the 1980s, China has been promising concessions in the western sector if India makes concessions in the east.
However, India regards Tawang as an integral part of Arunachal Pradesh.
China claims Arunachal Pradesh as part of Tibet and objects to visits by dignitaries to the area.
Last year, China criticized the US for sending its ambassador in India Richard Verma to the Arunachal region.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang then said Washington should respect efforts by China and India toward peaceful reconciliation.
India described Verma’s visit as “nothing unusual.”
China and India had fought a brief war in 1962 over parts of the 3,500km border that they share.
H.H. Dalai Lama is a spiritual leader, and has all the rights in the World to visit Tawang where one of the holiest of Buddhist shrine is located. Chinese invaders needs to be thrown out of Occupied Tibet.
After all Europeans and company are thrown out of Americas
This "spiritual leader" BS is getting really old and lame.
Dalai Lama is nothing more than a product of an old, clownish, superstitious practice of the former feudal Tibetan regime, known for its oppressive, barbaric serfdom and the laughable belief in reincarnation.
If the Dalai Lama really believes he’s the true reincarnation of the previous Dalai Lama, then he should stand trial for crime against humanity.
xcvxc
To be fair to China, India shouldn’t occupy the southern part of Tibet. You can’t be hyprocitical of one but not the other. You argument will only carry weight if you can show yourself as a genuine fighter for those under privileged and oppresed Tibetans who dare to rebel him.For example, Dorje Shudgen worshippers are living under tremendously difficult conditions under the iron rules of dalai lama and his cronies since the worldwide ban on this deity. Literally, these poor beings are living in fear of retribution if they are found to pray to their deity secretly. They are treated like pariahs in their own communty in India and some have no choice but to flee. if you’d care to open your mind a little and admit that there are indeed problems with this despotic majesty. He can’t be both political and spritual as it will never work as politians are all crooks.
He is just a human being like everyone else. To err is human. My motto is never to put your whole trust in a spiritual leader, let alone a political one. If he is genuinely a holy person, he should let go of all his self-grasping and delusions, his fascination with designer sunglasses and watches and just retire into some mountains and do alot of prayers and meditations for all living beings.
George Silversurfer : What has that got to do with Chinese Occupation of Tibet? So if you are constipated, others should not go to the toilet? OR if someone is constipated, you will not go to the toilet?