Russia refuses visa to Dalai Lama

Dharamsala (Himachal Pradesh): The Dalai Lama has once again been denied a visa by the Russian government to visit the Buddhist dominated republic of Kalmykia, sources said.

Consequently, the citizens of Kalmykia are dismayed that this year too they will not be able to hear their spiritual leader, Tibetan sources said Saturday.

Dharamsala in Himachal Pradesh is the seat of the Tibetan government in exile. The Dalai Lama had fled Tibet in 1959 and taken refuge in India.

This is the second time in three years that Moscow has declined the Kalmyk people’s request for a visa to the Dalai Lama.

Kirsan llyumzhinov, the president of Kalmykia, has travelled a couple of times to Dharamsala to extend his people’s invitation to the Dalai Lama.

The Russian foreign ministry Wednesday announced the decision to refuse a visa to the Dalai Lama.

“Guided by the principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of other countries and being aware of the sensitivity of the Tibet issue, we would not allow a visit by the Dalai Lama to Kalmykia at the invitation of a top official,” the Russian foreign ministry reportedly said.

The Dalai Lama has visited Kalmykia twice earlier.

A majority of Kalmykia’s 130,000 people are descendants of the Mongol Oriat tribe and followers of Tibetan Buddhism. For decades, they have been persecuted by Stalinists.

In 1943, Stalin exiled the entire Kalmyk population to Siberia and northern parts of Russia. After his death, the Kalmyk Autonomous Republic was established and its people allowed to return.

Then Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev’s 1986 glasnost paved the way for the revival of Kalmykia’s destroyed Buddhist traditions.

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