US University Doesn’t Withdraw Invitation To Dalai Lama Despite Protests From Chinese Students
Chinese students at the University of California, San Diego, (UCSD) have expressed resentment over the invitation extended by the university to the Dalai Lama for a keynote address this June. Despite protests, the UCSD has refused to withdraw the invitation, saying it has called him to promote his message of “global responsibility and service to humanity”.
China has long insisted that the Dalai Lama, who is a political exile, has been engaged in anti-China, separatist activities under the cloak of religion with the aim of breaking Tibet away from China.
Bonnie Glaser, Director of the China Power Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, viewed the protest by Chinese students as an attempt to limit free speech in America. "Let those Chinese students prevent freedom of speech in their own country. Not here. Not ever," she wrote on Twitter.
According to the Xinhua News Agency, many Chinese students view the situation differently, and that the practice of protesting against commencement speakers is nothing new. In an opinion piece for the student-run newspaper UCSD Guardian, Ruixuan Wang wrote,
The main reason why many Chinese students are upset is that our university shows little consideration about cultural respect, as he (the Dalai Lama) is a politically sensitive person in China.
A group of Chinese students will soon be meeting with the university's chancellor to discuss the content of the upcoming speech, and it does not plan to ask the chancellor to disinvite the Dalai Lama, reports Quartz. Instead, the plan is to request the chancellor to "send out statements that clarify the content of Dalai Lama's speech”, “make sure his speech has nothing to do with politics” and “stop using words like ‘spiritual leader’ or 'exile'” to describe the Dalai Lama.
With Inputs From ANI.