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Tibetan exile govt urges China to reveal whereabouts of Panchen Lama
NEW DELHI, May 17, 2020 (BSS/AFP) – Tibet’s parliament-in-exile on
Sunday called for Beijing to confirm the “well-being and whereabouts”
of the Panchen Lama, the second-most important figure in Tibetan
Buddhism’s largest school, a quarter of a century after he
disappeared.
The whereabouts of Gedhun Choekyi Nyima — the boy recognised as the
reincarnation of the Panchen Lama by the Dalai Lama on May 14, 1995 —
have not been known since he was taken into custody three days later
by Chinese authorities aged six.
“China must provide verifiable information on the wellbeing and
whereabouts of the 11th Panchen Lama,” the Tibetan
parliament-in-exile, which is based in Dharamsala in the foothills of
the Indian Himalaya, said in a statement.
“The disappearance of the Panchen Lama is not only an injustice to
one person, but it is an injustice to six million Tibetans and their
right to religious freedom.”
The US Thursday renewed calls on China — which has appointed its
own Panchen Lama — to free the Tibetan, who rights activists have
called the world’s youngest political prisoner.
The Dalai Lama has made India his home since fleeing Tibet in 1959,
and resides in Dharamsala in the north of the country.
In February he marked the 80th anniversary of his enthronement as
the spiritual leader of Tibet, a position held almost entirely in
exile and as a target of constant vilification by the Chinese state.
China’s officially atheist government has said it could seek to name
a successor to the 84-year-old Tibetan spiritual leader.
In 2015 the official Xinhua news agency quoted an official in Tibet
as saying that the Panchen Lama was healthy, enjoying an education and
“does not want to be disturbed”.
BSS/AFP/MRU/2115hrs