Not Desirable

No doubt it’s easy to criticise from a country where China isn’t a huge and looming presence, but still, this is disappointing from South Korea:

Last week, 22 of 28 Nobel Peace Prize winners gathered in South Korea for the 2006 Gwangju (Kwangju) Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates. Winners from Kenya, Russia, Guatemala, Iran, East Timor, and the United Kingdom have accepted invitations, as have representatives from Nobel-winning organizations, such as Amnesty International, the International Red Cross, and the American Friends Service Committee.
The Dalai Lama, however, couldn’t attend. Not because he wasn’t invited, or because he had other plans: like those other laureates, the Dalai Lama, winner of the 1989 award, had also accepted an invitation from the Kim Dae-jung Presidential Library to a summit about peace on the Korean Peninsula and in all of East Asia.
But the South Korean government has refused to grant him a visa, letting politics trump its own peace initiatives. As a Foreign Ministry official told Human Rights Watch, “Considering various factors, for now, we decided the Dalai Lama’s visit to South Korea is not desirable.’’
The government of South Korea, sensitive to the wishes of China, has consistently refused the Dalai Lama entry to its territory. In 2000, for example, a committee of private citizens representing 73 religious and civic organizations invited the Dalai Lama to visit in November. The South Korean government was in no way involved.
After the Chinese embassy in Seoul made known its displeasure, a representative of the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade met with group members and asked that they postpone the suggested visit until 2001. That visit never took place; nor did one proposed by the student council of Seoul National University that same year. The Dalai Lama had planned to deliver a speech at the university on peace and non-violence. But, said a Foreign Ministry official, “His visit would not be beneficial to the country’s national interest.’’
For many, the Dalai Lama is not only a desired visitor but an emblem of their desire for peace. How ironic, then, that he was prevented from contributing last week to a gathering dedicated in part to “reaffirm democracy and human rights as universal values of human kind and the foundation of peace around the world.’’