Dalai Lama recovering, will soon return to work: aide

Thursday, September 04, 2008

NEW DELHI (AFP) — Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama has recovered well from a stomach illness that put him in hospital for four days and hopes to resume work at the end of the month, an aide said Thursday.

His Holiness the Dalai Lama leaves Lilavati hospital in Mumbai, on Monday morning, 1 September 2008, smiling and waving to waiting photographers. REUTERS/Punit Paranjpe (INDIA)

The 73-year-old Nobel peace laureate was discharged on Monday from a Mumbai hospital where he had been admitted for tests after suffering abdominal pain.

"He is doing well and is now resting in New Delhi for a few days," his spokesman, Tenzin Takhla, told AFP by telephone. "He will soon be back travelling internationally."

In the weeks preceding his illness, the Dalai Lama had pursued a hectic itinerary as he campaigned for improved human rights in Tibet while China hosted the Olympic Games.

He is scheduled to hold teaching sessions in Dharamshala, the seat of the exiled Tibetan government in northern India, from September 25, according to his official website, before travelling to Switzerland and Germany.

The Dalai Lama's health scare prompted special Buddhist prayer meetings in Dharamshala with dozens of monks and nuns gathering at the main temple to pray for his well-being.

The Buddhist monk fled into exile in India in 1959 following a failed uprising in Tibet against Chinese rule.

He champions a "middle path" policy which espouses "meaningful autonomy" for Tibet, rather than the full independence that many younger, more radical activists are demanding.

Still, China vilified him as the "mastermind" of what it called a drive to sabotage the Olympics and destabilise the country.

Violent protests against Beijing's rule broke out across Tibet in March, sparking a heavy Chinese crackdown that drew global condemnation.