Opinions

On 8 May, among many issues the Tibetan prime minister discussed at the Council on Foreign Relations think tank, Dr Lobsang Sangay said: ‘We don't challenge, or ask for, an overthrow of the Communist Party. We don't question or challenge the present structure of the ruling party.’ The ruling party being the Communist Party of China (CCP).

Nearly three weeks (at the time of this article first published) after the death of 83 workers in a landslide near a village in Tibet, which official Chinese media characterized as a natural disaster, suspicion is rising that it resulted from improper mining activity.

On April 24, 2013, two youths, Lobsang Dawa, 20, and Kunchok Woser, 23, lit themselves on fire near their monastery in eastern Tibet. The toll of Tibetans who have chosen to self-immolate has now reached 117, one of the highest in recent world history. The prime cause of this tragedy is the profound resentment of and resistance to China’s continued occupation and repression in Tibet.

When Andrug Gompo Tashi set up the Chushigangdruk (Four Rivers Six Ranges) in Lhoka in the summer of ‘58, and commenced resistance operations, Chinese garrisons and outpost in those areas were taken by surprise. Fearing that the local population might join or support Chushigangdruk,

Ancient pilgrims and scholars who made the journey to Buddhist India summed up the fruit of their intense collective spiritual endeavour with these words: the waters of the Ganges have made the desert sands of Central Asia bloom. This saying disregards geography.

During Hu Jintao’s visit to Delhi in March 2012, about 200 Tibetans found themselves summarily detained for peacefully expressing their views. This includes well-known Tibetan activist Tenzin Tsundue, who was arrested as he was participating in a seminar, supposedly because of his past

For some months, now large-scale protests and violent street battles have been raging throughout Cairo and other major cities of Egypt. Thousands of Egyptian liberals and secularists have come out on the streets to protest what they called President Mohamed Morsi’s “power-grab”, after he issued a declaration awarding himself new powers, which he claimed were “temporary” until a new constitution was put in place. Morsi’s opposition will have none of it and claim that he wants to make himself “the new Pharaoh”.

In its March 10 statement this year, the Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile made a far-reaching assertion. The Parliament warned the Tibetan people not to “resort to speaking, writing articles, and propagating information through the various communication channels without any sense of responsibility.”

In a little restaurant near Kathmandu, a young Tibetan man approached a Western woman and told her that Tibet is a beautiful country and that he loved his country very much. What sounded like a casual conversation turned out to be a solemn statement.

On the just past warming up Saturday of April, the Diwan-i-Aam of Delhi's Taj Mahal hotel was witness to a unique event which is bound to go down in the spiritual history of Delhi as one of the most outstanding days of confluence of hearts, souls, music and spirituality.