The Dalai Lama is considering a request from Buddhists in Russia’s Kalmykia region to visit them later this month, a spokesman for the Tibetan exile government said Saturday.
“We are considering a visit by the Dalai Lama to Kalmykia at the end of this month,” said Tenzin Takla, information officer in the Dalai Lama’s headquarters in the northern Indian town of Dharmsala. Half of Kalmykia’s 300,000 residents are Buddhists.
Takla’s comments came a day after Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Moscow may issue a visa to the Dalai Lama if his trip serves exclusively religious purposes. However, the Dalai Lama has yet to apply for a visa, he said.
Russia had rejected visa requests on behalf of Tibet’s spiritual leader at least three times in recent years, saying it considers Tibet to be “an inalienable part of China,” and has refrained from any official contacts with the Dalai Lama.
But Lavrov said Friday that Russia “would be ready to consider an application if such a trip serves only pastoral purposes, has an exclusively religious character and doesn’t envisage any contacts with officials.”
China occupied Tibet in 1951 and claims that the Himalayan region has been Chinese territory for centuries.
The Dalai Lama fled into exile in India after an aborted uprising against Chinese rule in 1959 and travels frequently to conduct Buddhist ceremonies and seek support for his campaign for Tibetan political and cultural rights.
