India's Modi gives Dalai Lama a birthday call

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday announced on Twitter that he had called Tibet's spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, to congratulate him on his birthday.

"Spoke on phone to His Holiness the @DalaiLama to convey greetings on his 86th birthday. We wish him a long and healthy life," Modi said in his tweet.

Modi's call comes as relations are at a low ebb with neighboring China, which generally disapproves of any show of support for the Dalai Lama, whom it considers a subversive "splittist" working for Tibet's independence.

Indian leaders have generally deferred to China, with Modi's government, for example, in 2019 asking Tibetans in India not to hold a rally to mark the anniversary of a failed uprising in 1959 against Chinese rule.

'Peaceful liberation' by China

Chinese troops took over Tibet in 1950 in what Beijing calls a "peaceful liberation." The Dalai Lama fled into exile nine years later following the uprising and has lived in northern India ever since.

Although New Delhi recognizes Tibet as an autonomous region of China, it has several territorial disputes with Beijing elsewhere on its border, which extends 3,500 kilometers (2,200 miles) in the Himalayan region.

In June 2020, Chinese troops attacked an Indian border patrol with rocks and clubs, killing 20 soldiers on the Indian side and reporting the loss of four of its own. That clash, the most serious in decades, led to a deterioration of relations.

Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen also wished the Dalai Lama a happy birthday and expressed gratitude for his spiritual guidance during the coronavirus pandemic.

 "Thank you for teaching us the importance of coming together to help one another through this pandemic," she wrote in a tweet.

Call for compassion

The Dalai Lama, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989 for his nonviolent campaign for democracy and freedom in his homeland, thanked his Buddhist followers in a video message.

In it, he expressed his appreciation of his adopted home of India and urged his followers to observe his teachings of nonviolence and compassion.

"I can assure you that, for the rest of my life, I am committed to serving humanity and working to protect the climate condition," he said. 

tj/aw (Reuters, dpa)