As the clock ticks, is Beijing ready to renew talks with the Dalai Lama, Tibet’s spiritual leader?

Name: Tibetans in exile march in solidarity with Dalai Lama in India
Uploaded: 2023-07-22T03:00:11.000Z
Duration: 2 min 45 s
Description: Tibetans in exile march in solidarity with Dalai Lama in India

Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader says Chinese officials have reached out, adding he is ‘always open to talk’

It is critical to resume negotiations on succession ‘while the Dalai Lama is still alive’, representative says

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The Dalai Lama, Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader, celebrated his 88th birthday earlier this month. Photo: EPA-EFE/TRIPTA

Liu Zhen

Published: 11:00am, 22 Jul 2023Updated: 11:58am, 23 Jul 2023

Corrected [11:55am, 23 Jul, 2023]

[11:55am, 23 Jul, 2023]
This article was been ammended to clarify that the Dalai Lama said Chinese officials wanted to contact him, not that they had been in contact.

The Dalai Lama, Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader, has said Chinese officials are seeking to contact him but restarting talks might be challenging, observers said.

The Dalai Lama, who celebrated his 88th birthday earlier this month, said last week that Chinese officials had sought contact with him, “officially or unofficially”.

He did not provide further details, but said he was “always open to talk”.

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Tibetans in exile march in solidarity with Dalai Lama in India

“Chinese officials have now realised that the Tibetan people’s spirits are very strong, so in order to deal with Tibetan problems they want to contact me,” the 14th Dalai Lama told reporters in Dharamsala, India, where he previously set up the Tibetan government-in-exile (TGIE). He stepped down as the political head of the body in 2011.

“I am also ready,” he said, adding that Tibetans were not seeking independence and had decided to remain part of the People’s Republic of China.

Norzin Dolma, a minister with the TGIE, had earlier confirmed that there had been recent “backchannel communications” with Beijing “unofficially and informally”.

She said it was critical to resume negotiations while the Dalai Lama is still alive.