14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatzo

After years of heading the exiled Tibetan movement, the Dalai Lama will resign his political role. After years of leading his people both spiritually and politically he believes it is time for an elected official, but will remain involved with the movement. The Bangkok Post reports:

The Dalai Lama announced Thursday his plan to retire as political head of the exiled Tibetan movement, saying the time had come for his replacement by a “freely elected” leader.

The Dalai Lama, whose more significant role is as the movement’s spiritual leader, said he would seek an amendment allowing him to resign his political office when the exiled Tibetan parliament meets next week.

“My desire to devolve authority has nothing to do with a wish to shirk responsibility,” he said in an address in Dharamshala, the seat of the Tibetan government-in-exile in northern India.

“It is to benefit Tibetans in the long run. It is not because I feel disheartened,” he added.

[Continues at Bangkok Post]

Tibet’s spiritual leader plans to step down as head of the Tibetan government-in-exile, his spokesman said.

The Dalai Lama, 75, has scaled back his duties leading Tibet since 2001, when the Tibetan movement first directly elected a political leader. Since then, his government role has been mainly ceremonial as he travels around the world giving speeches. His spokesman said he would discuss retiring with the next session of parliament in March. Though it might not be too easy to get away; the speaker of Tibet’s parliament said that a retirement requires consideration, since it would mean a sweeping political change.

“Retirement” would mainly mean stepping away from ceremonial duties as head of government, like signing resolutions. The Dalai Lama would still remain an advocate for the Tibetan movement and a Buddhist spiritual leader.

The Dalai Lama, who was born Tenzin Gyatso, is the highest-ranking Buddhist priest and seen as an incarnation of the original Dalai Lama from the 1300s. Finding a replacement requires a formal search party, though many expect the 26-year-old monk Karmapa to one day take his place.

[Continues at TIME]

Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama. Photo by Luca Galuzzi - www.galuzzi.it

A US president is again choosing to meet the Dalai Lama despite Chinese opposition. BBC News asks why this Tibetan spiritual and political leader is such a popular figure in the West:

To the Chinese government and to many of its people he is an inciter of violence and a defender of a brutal, backward, feudalistic, theocratic society.

But to many politicians and people in the West, the Dalai Lama is a kind of smiling, spiritual and political superhero.

His monastic robes, beaming countenance and squarish, unfashionable glasses are the stuff of a thousand photo opportunities. To some he is in a league of international personalities that contains only one other person – Nelson Mandela.

He is well-known for his contact with Hollywood supporters like Richard Gere and Steven Segal.

Those who have met him describe an intense personal charisma.

There is a “wonderful smiling face, cherubic looks, the infectious laugh” says Alexander Norman, who co-operated with the Dalai Lama on his autobiography as well as several other works after first meeting him in 1988.

It is hard to escape the idea that the Dalai Lama is perceived almost as an avuncular “Santa Claus” figure by some, says Dr Nathan Hill, senior lecturer in Tibetan at the School of Oriental and African Studies.

“He is very photogenic. In the West we like stars. He is an extremely engaging person, and an extremely smart man. I find him extremely savvy politically, very forward looking.”

There are many in the West who are seeking an unthreatening spiritual boost in an age of materialism, suggests Norman, who recently wrote The Secret Lives of the Dalai Lama.

“There is a huge desire in the secular West… a hunger for something other than the benefits that modern industrial society can supply.”

Search on Amazon for the Dalai Lama’s books and you see long lists of spiritual and self-help tracts.

“He is unstained by the world [to some readers],” says Dr Hill. “You want to read his books in order to find enlightenment yourself.” …

[continues at BBC News]

For the first time in 18 years, the Dalai Lama is visiting Washington this week without stopping by to see the U.S. president.

Tibet’s exiled religious leader — brushed aside by U.S. President Barack Obama in favor of communist China — was saluted at the U.S. Capitol on Tuesday for his work for human rights. The presentation ceremony underscored Obama’s dilemma in dealing with China, a growing power and the biggest holder of U.S. debt.

The decision not to meet the Tibetan leader was made amid efforts to improve U.S.-Chinese relations on issues from stemming global warming to reigning in North Korea’s nuclear weapons.

In a statement, Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, top Republican on the Foreign Affairs Committee, accused Obama of “kowtowing to Beijing” by refusing to meet with the 74-year-old monk.