DC Edit | US delegation’s meeting with Dalai Lama is India’s message to China

A bipartisan congressional delegation of seven prominent US lawmakers visited Dharmshala in Himachal Pradesh to hold dialogue with the Dalai Lama and assure him of US support for Tibet’s full autonomy.

The presence of former Speaker of the United States House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi, who once attacked China by visiting Taiwan in 2022 while in office, and the chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee Republican House Representative Michael McCaul was supposed to signal to China that its views on the territory are not always considered the final word and its sensitivities will not silence the world forever.

The US president is also expected to soon sign the Resolve Tibet Act, after the bill, introduced last month in the House of Representatives by Mr McCaul, who also led the delegation to Dharamshala, received overwhelming bipartisan support. “The United States strongly condemns any oppression and coercion against Tibetans,” Mr. McCaul said during the bill’s testing.

Whether or not the signing of the bill succeeds in giving the Tibetan people responsibility for their own future by beginning a dialogue with China over the status of their land, it is certain to further annoy China by calling into question the law Project. This idea has been propagated for so long that Tibet has been part of China since ancient times.

India is not just a spectator of the meeting between the United States and the Dalai Lama, as it facilitated this interaction as part of a strategic ploy while showing its capacity to stand up to China . It’s unclear how this will add to tensions as troops from the two nations face off from too-close-for-comfort quarters.

The message is clear: India will not stand by as China continues to play games by renaming places in India like Arunachal Pradesh and opposing the Prime Minister’s visits to that country.

Tacitly supporting the concept of an autonomous Tibet is a counter card that India is playing here, even if the United States raises the question of Chinese actions which led the Dalai Lama and a whole series of Tibetans to seek refuge in India since 1959.

The US lawmakers’ meeting with the Dalai Lama on Indian soil will not change India’s stated position of recognizing Tibet as part of China after treating it as a de facto independent country.

What India’s position is trying to convey here is that it wants Beijing to resolve tensions with Tibet and help protect the region’s indigenous Buddhist culture, which has drawn heavily on Buddhism as It is practiced in India and which has favored cultural and religious links with Tibet.

While talks to resolve border issues that arose during the 2020 Galwan clashes went nowhere after initial agreements negated some of India’s advantage, India may have decided to up the ante during the latest round of mediation by US lawmakers. ” meeting with the Tibetan spiritual leader whom China describes as a separatist.