His Holiness the Dalai Lama calls for disarmament to pave way for global peace[Saturday, 20 November 2010, 11:31 a.m.]

His Holiness the Dalai Lama greets nuns from the Missionaries of Charity in Kolkata  – the late Mother Teresa’s order – upon receiving the Mother Teresa Memorial International Award for Social Justice in New Delhi on 18 November 2010. His Holiness received the award in honour of his commitments to human values, fostering inter-religious dialogue, and the welfare of the Tibetan people.Photo:Getty Images

New Delhi:
His Holiness the Dalai Lama on Friday called for a violence-free world
emphasising the need to demilitarise the world. “But before we work for
universal disarmament, we must first go through internal disarmament,”
he said while delivering a lecture on ‘Human Approach to World Peace’
at the Institute of Social Sciences (ISS). The lecture was organised as
part of the silver jubilee year of the institute.His Holiness
said human intelligence can be a source of progress as well as
organised violence as has been amply demonstrated by history. In the
last century, he said over 200 million lives were lost in war and
bloodshed adding if nuclear weapons were not used to justify organised
or legalised violence, then there may be some justification for their
development. He said it is unfathomable how a person who kills
another is called a murderer and someone who kills thousands of people
in legalised violence such as war is called hero when in fact, he ought
to be called a great murderer.Rather than learning from
history, today billions of money are spent on developing nuclear
weapons when pressing human problems like poverty are left unsolved at
national as well as global level, he said. There is a need to educate
people, create awareness on such issues, he added.Small acts of
kindness and convictions go a long way in making a world of difference,
he said. “Some people when confronted with many global problems often
feel helpless and discouraged,” he said. “That’s a mistake. The
initiative must come from individuals.”     His Holiness said
the very nature of violence is unpredictable and in the new global
reality where economic and environmental issues have rendered
conventional boundaries irrelevant, there is a need to cultivate the
spirit of dialogue, compromise, and transparency in finding solutions
to disagreements and pressing global problems.“That’s the human
way of approach to peace,” His Holiness said. “We Tibetans have adopted
this approach to find a mutually agreeable solution to the Tibetan
problem through dialogue.” Responding to questions from the
audience, he expressed his conviction in the power of ideas. “If based
on truth, justice and compassion, these ideas can bring positive
results in the long run,” he said citing Costa Rica’s approach at
demilitarisation as an example. Asked how the world should
deal with the likes of al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden and Taliban’s
Mullah Omar, His Holiness dismissed the notion of bringing about peace
through war. At the time of 9/11 attacks on New York’s Twin Towers,
there was one Bin Laden, but now there probably are more, he said. Before
delivering the lecture, His Holiness unveiled a portrait of George
Fernandes, a lifelong socialist and former Indian Defence Minister at
the institute.In his welcome address, ISS director George
Mathew said George Fernandes has been a relentless campaigner for the
cause the Dalai Lama has stood throughout. For the institute, George
Fernandes has been a great source of inspiration and support since the
time it was only an idea, Mr Mathew said.“When I told George in
1984 about establishing an institution, he readily encouraged me.  He
gave me Rs 50,000, which he had collected from the trade unions in
Bombay and that was the financial foundation of this Institute which
began with a 3-member staff in a rented apartment in south Delhi in
1985,’’ Mr Mathew recalled.Dr UR Ananthamurthy, chairman of the
institute and a leading luminary in the new literature movement in
Kannada language expressed hope that like Nelson Mandela and Aung San
Suu Kyi, His Holiness will also see freedom soon. “You will get your
Tibet too because truth triumphs.”The Institute of Social
Sciences, founded in 1985, was the result of an intellectual quest to
provide socially relevant and activism-oriented research and aims to
study contemporary social, political and economic issues, with an
inter-disciplinary perspective. The Institute makes its research
findings and recommendations available to government bodies, policy
makers, social scientists and workers’ organisations so as to widen
their options for action.