The Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, apologized Monday after a video emerged of him asking a boy to suck his tongue.
The video, which has gone viral and sparked outrage, shows the 87-year-old Dalai Lama kissing the boy’s lips as he bows to pay his respects.
The Buddhist monk is later seen sticking out his tongue as he asks the child to suck on it. “You can suck my tongue,” the leader is heard asking the young man in the video.
The video is from an event in McLeod Ganj, a suburb of the northern Indian city of Dharamshala, on February 28.
“His Holiness would like to apologize to the young man and his family, as well as his many friends around the world, for any harm his words may have caused,” he said in a statement on Twitter.
“His Holiness often teases people he meets in an innocent and playful manner, even in public and in front of cameras,” he added. “He regrets the incident.”
Twitter users reacted to the video calling it “disgusting” and “absolutely sick”.
The Dalai Lama remains the universally recognized face of the Tibetan autonomy movement.
However, the fame he enjoyed after winning the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989 waned and the deluge of invitations to join world leaders and Hollywood stars diminished as the leader reduced his travel schedule due to his age, but also due to the growing China’s economic and political weight.
Beijing accuses him of trying to divide China and called him a “monk-robed wolf”.
In 2019, the Dalai Lama apologized for saying that if his successor was a woman, she should be “attractive”.
The comments, which were criticized around the world, were made in an interview with the BBC.
Source: DN
