Phurbu Thinley
Osaka, November 16: China is unhappy again as His Holiness the Dalai Lama began his Japan tour at the request of the country’s own Buddhist groups.
China, as usual, wasted no time on Thursday to perversely complain Japan as the Tibetan leader in exile started a nine-day tour of the country.
China has officially expressed regret over Japan’s decision to allow Tibetan leader visit the country, according to China’s state controlled media.
“We expressed our regret over Japan’s permission of Dalai’s entry into Japan and his visit to the country,” the media quoted the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao as saying at a regular press conference.
Japan’s top government officials are refraining from meeting the exiled leader of Tibet during the visit. Despite Japanese Government’s cautious effort not to offend the Communist giant’s sentiments, the mere visit by His Holiness at religious groups’ invitation has drawn in China’s sharp rebuke on Thursday.
In its effort to lull a closer tie with China, Japan has gone to the extend of not providing security guards or police escorts for most of the Dalai Lama’s trip, in contrast to visits in 1995, 1998 and 2000 according to a report by a Japanese newspaper.
“I feel ashamed of to see how he is treated here, compared with how Western democracies honor him, despite the risk of aggravating China,” Seishu Makino, a former Lower House member and founder of the Japanese Parliamentary Group for Tibet, had reportedly said.
Japan’s decision is disappointing given the country’s sizeable Buddhist population; another report cited the Dalai Lama’s Tokyo representative Lhakpa Tshoko as saying.
His Holiness was, however, extended a warm welcome on by the inviting Japanese Buddhist groups on Thursday at the Haneda airport where he arrived from the Tokyo International airport to leave for a one-day private stay at Kanazawa.
On Sunday, His Holiness will tour the holiest Shinto shrine of Ise and will preside over an interfaith forum participated by Shinto, Buddhist and Shugendo faiths on the same day at the Kogakkan University. On November 20, His Holiness will speak for a sold-out crowd of some 5000 plus at a Buddhist Conference in Yokohama.
His Holiness the Dalai Lama, revered by Tibetans as their undisputed leader, fled to India in 1959 following Communist China’s unprecedented repressions in his homeland. He now campaigns for a meaningful autonomy for the whole of Tibetan territory that existed prior to China’s occupation in 1949.
