August 1, 2000
A compromise has been reached. The Dalai Lama has been persuaded to speak at the Millennium Peace Summit of Spiritual leaders being held at the United Nations from 28 August, but his keynote speech may not be delivered inside the UN compound.
The Dalai Lama's bureau here as well as his followers all over the world, including Mr Ford Roosevelt, grandson of late US president, Franklin Roosevelt, said there was Chinese pressure to exclude him from the summit.
The coordinator from the Indian sub-continent is Dr Bhupendra Modi and while he says that the Indian contingent persuaded the Dalai Lama, he doesn't want to say he will not be speaking inside the compound. The carefully-worded statement says the Dalai Lama would be the keynote speaker at the closing session, but does not say where it will be held.
"The Dalai Lama will be speaking at the Waldorf-Astoria (a plush New York hotel)," said Ms Aditi Mody, the Modi foundation spokesperson, when asked if the speech would be inside the UN compound. Later, she called to say "the last two days of the summit would be outside the UN. The final venue is yet to be decided. "
Asked if China did not want him to participate in the summit, Ms Mody said: "I can't comment. We are glad to have His Holiness." She added that UN representatives had gone to meet him.
The Dalai Lama's followers all over the world were outraged that the UN Secretary-General, Mr Kofi Annan, had not invited him. Apart from a large number of Tibetans all over the world, one of those strongly crusading for the Dala Lama's inclusion was Mr Ford Roosevelt, grandson of two people who helped set up the United Nations: the late President Roosevelt, four times elected President of the USA and his crusader wife, Eleanor.
"It would not have been their wish, I am certain, to exclude any leaders from such a conference, and certainly not one as esteemed in the world as His Holiness," Mr Roosevelt said. Mr Roosevelt told The Statesman he has been a supporter of the articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. "I met His Holiness with my family several years ago and he asked for our help. I will continue to aid in his cause in any way possible... The non-violent approach he practices is truly the only way we as humans can relate to each other for ultimate survival and harmony in the world. "I also believe he and his fellow Tibetans have been dealt a grave injustice by the Chinese rulers," he said.
Mr Roosevelt has signed a petition saying that Mr Annan "should have the moral courage to stand up against Chinese pressure and inducements and should reverse his earlier decision and invite His Holiness - one of the most revered spiritual leaders on the planet as well as a Nobel Prize winning laureate - to the gathering for peace."
A large number of Tibetan organisations have signed the petition. A representative of the Dalai Lama in Delhi, Mr Tshering Tashi, said that no invitation had been issued initially. "But there was a hue and cry and His Holiness was belatedly invited to be a keynote speaker at a religious conference being held outside the United Nations in New York at the same time," Mr Tashi said.
