The Dalai Lama shares his thoughts on China and its future in a new book

Years later, he watched in dismay as China continued its efforts to coerce Tibetans into assimilation, using tactics that included sending Tibetan children to their Mandarin-language schools. and it is taught that the Chinese freed the Tibetans from slavery. He is also an outspoken critic of China’s treatment of its citizens.

“Judging by the last decade of Xi’s rule, in terms of individual freedom and daily life, China seems to be returning to the oppressive policies of Mao’s time, but implemented through state-of-the-art digital technology for monitoring and control,” he wrote.

The Dalai Lama also discusses the pressing issue of his succession.

Tibetan Buddhists believe that the Dalai Lama is the 14th reincarnation of previous Dalai Lamas, and that he is an enlightened being who returns in subsequent lives to continue his work as a spiritual leader. But the Dalai Lama warned that China may try to elect a 15th Dalai Lama after his death, as it did with the Panchen Lama, another Tibetan spiritual leader.

To avoid Chinese interference, the Dalai Lama said he would reincarnate in the “free world”, outside of Tibet or China. And when he turns 90 this year, he wrote, he will consult with Tibetan religious leaders and citizens about ending the Dalai Lama’s institution altogether.

“Voice for the Voiceless” will be published by William Morrow in the US and HarperNonFiction in the UK on March 11, and will be published in Australia, Canada, Germany, Italy, France, the Netherlands and Brazil. It is also being published in Tibetan and translated into Chinese, in the hope that it may have an impact on some Chinese readers, said Thupten Jinpa, the Dalai Lama’s longtime translator. although the book may be banned in China.

“He wanted a testimony and an account of the development of his thinking,” Jinpa said. “This book is an attempt to present in a single volume all his efforts, not in bringing the Chinese to a treaty of negotiation, but in re-establishing the Tibetan civilization in exile.”