Dalai Lama warns against talk of ‘clash of civilisations’

The Dalai Lama, Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader, has warned against portraying Islam as a religion of violence, saying Muslims have been wrongly demonised in the West since the September 11 attacks. Promoting religious tolerance, the world’s most influential Buddhist leader said on Sunday that talk of “a clash of civilisations between the West and Muslim world is wrong and dangerous.”

Muslim terrorist attacks have distorted people’s views of Islam, making them believe it is an extremist faith rather than one based on compassion, the Dalai Lama told a press conference in New Delhi. All religions have extremists and “it is wrong to generalise (about Muslims),” the 71-year-old spiritual leader said.

Hindustan Times, 12 June 2007