MADRID – Exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama said on Wednesday “cultural genocide” was taking place in his homeland, with a wave of ethnic Chinese migrants making Tibetans a minority in their own region.
“Some kind of cultural genocide is taking place,” the Nobel Peace Prize winner told a conference in the Spanish capital. “The culture (in danger) is very relevant to today’s world.”
Ethnic Chinese now outnumber Tibetans in most large towns and probably overall in the Tibet Autonomous Region, he said, adding however that it was difficult to get reliable data.
The Dalai Lama, who has run a government-in-exile from India since fleeing Tibet following a failed uprising in 1959, says he wants greater autonomy, not independence, for the Himalayan region.
However he said when a native population becomes a minority, autonomy becomes meaningless, adding he had discussed his concerns about Tibet’s growing ethnic Chinese population with U.S. President George W. Bush during a September meeting.
Speaking during a two-day visit to Spain where he will accept a prize for promoting human rights, he said any damage to Tibetan culture would be a loss for all of China.
China, whose troops marched in to Tibet in 1951, says the Dalai Lama is using his religious prominence to try and split Tibet from the motherland. The Chinese embassy in Madrid could not be immediately reached for comment.
The Dalai Lama, who is speaking at a number of private events in Madrid, said his visit was non-political and he had not requested a meeting with the Spanish government. “Wherever I go, I do not want to create any confusion or embarrassment.”
Asked at an earlier event if he was being shunned by governments around the world, including Spain, because of Chinese pressure, he replied: “It seems you know the answer to that question.”
