Dalai Lama 'fully' supports the Olympics

4 hours ago

EVRY, France (AFP) — The Dalai Lama reaffirmed his support for the Beijing Olympics on Tuesday, as he gave his blessing to a vast new Buddhist temple near Paris on the second day of a visit to France.

"I fully support the Olympic Games," the Tibetan spiritual leader told journalists at the Vietnamese pagoda in Evry south of Paris, where some 1,500 people gathered to hear him give two hours of religious teachings.

"The Chinese people deserve to host the Games," added the Nobel peace laureate, who Beijing has accused of fomenting unrest in Tibet to sabotage the event.

The 73-year-old Dalai Lama, who flew into Paris for 12 days on Monday as the Games got into full swing, shelved plans to meet President Nicolas Sarkozy while in France for fear of angering China.

Asked by a journalist to comment on the decision, he replied: "It doesn't matter", repeating that his trip to France was "spiritual", not political.

Aside from commenting briefly on the Olympics, the Dalai Lama stayed clear of politics as he blessed the Buddha of the new pagoda, in a ceremony beamed onto giant screens outside the temple.

Set for completion in two years, it is destined to be the largest in Europe, with a vast prayer room, a cultural centre and accommodation for Buddhist monks and followers.

The opposition Socialist mayor of Evry, Manuel Valls, and the Socialist head of the Paris region Jean-Paul Huchon were at Tuesday's ceremony, as was the bishop of Evry Michel Dubost -- and the British-born singer Jane Birkin.

Earlier the Dalai Lama led private prayers with 700 Buddhist faithful at the Yiga Tcheudzine temple in Veneux-les-Sablons, also south of the capital.

On a giant outdoor screen, the Tibetan spiritual leader could be seen joking and laughing with the invited audience of Buddhist followers, local officials and religious leaders.

Avoiding any reference to the situation in Tibet, he issued a call for peace, dialogue between the different faiths and "human compassion".

On Wednesday the Nobel peace laureate holds a press conference in Paris before meeting a group of 30 to 40 lawmakers for closed-door talks at the French Senate, but no government-level meetings are planned during his stay.

Instead, first lady Carla Bruni-Sarkozy will attend the inauguration of a temple in Lodeve in southern France Friday next week.

The rest of the Dalai Lama's visit, which runs to August 23, will be devoted to religious visits in northwestern Normandy and Brittany and a six-day teaching cycle in the western city of Nantes.

Planned more than two years ago, the Dalai Lama's French visit suddenly turned political after a Chinese crackdown on unrest in Tibet in March that sparked international outrage.

Tentative plans for a meeting with Sarkozy were dropped, at the Dalai Lama's request, to avoid angering China and setting back talks between Tibetan and Chinese parties, Sarkozy's office and members of the Buddhist leader's entourage said.

Beijing, which accuses the Dalai Lama of fomenting unrest in Tibet to undermine the Olympics, warned Paris a meeting would have "serious consequences" for bilateral relations.

France is struggling to mend ties frayed by Sarkozy's initial threat to boycott the opening of the Beijing Games, together with pro-Tibet protests during the passage of the Olympic flame through Paris that sparked a wave of anti-French protests in China.

France is home to an estimated 770,000 Buddhists, according to the French Buddhist union, three quarters of them of Asian origin.

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