Belgium, Netherlands uphold Tibetan right on Dalai Lama reincarnation issue

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His Holiness the Dalai Lama.

(TibetanReview.net, Feb05’20) – The governments of Belgium and the Netherland had made it clear in late 2019 that the reincarnate succession to Tibet’s spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, should be determined by the Tibetan believers themselves without any sort of interference from the Chinese state, said Washington-based International Campaign for Tibet (ICT) Feb 4.

ICT said that in response to a question from Member of Parliament Samuel Cogolati on his government’s position, Belgium’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Minister Philippe Goffin had said in Dec 2019, “it is logically up to the Tibetan religious community to designate his successor without interference from the temporal authorities.”

It added that similarly, in an official letter in late 2019, Dutch Foreign Affairs Minister Stef Blok said, “The position of this cabinet is that it is up to the Tibetan religious community itself to appoint a future successor to the Dalai Lama.”

The Dalai Lama has said he will leave behind instructions, as per Tibetan religious tradition, on the recognition of his reincarnation who would be the 15th in the line.

Atheist China has made it clear, however, that the reincarnate will be one chosen by it, rejecting the traditional primacy of the Dalai Lama’s own prerogative on the issue.

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