We are today commemorating a day of outstandingly high importance, marking the 90th birthday of His Holiness the Great 14th Dalai Lama, the Lord of the Victorious Ones, whose name – to state it in its wholeness to spell out what he fully means – is Jetsun Jamphel Ngawang Lobsang Yeshi Tenzin Gyatso Sisum Wanggyur Tsungpa Meypey-de Pal-Sangpo. His Holiness embodies the crowning glory of the world’s both material and spiritual, including those of the gods in the heavens. He is the designated patron-deity of Tibet, the Avalokiteshvara, who has incarnated in human form; the spiritual lord of the three realms of existence; a champion of world peace; a master of the entire corpus of the teachings of the Buddha on this earth; the guardian-deity of the entire Tibetan people; and an incomparable leader. On this momentous day of utmost importance, the Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile, speaking on behalf of all Tibetans, wishes to extend greetings and good wishes to His Holiness with feelings of joy, devotion, and gratification.

Born on the 6th of July in 1935 in the village of Taktser in Tsongkha area of eastern Tibet in Domey province, and named in his childhood as Lhamo Dhondup, the birth of His Holiness the Dalai Lama was a purposive one, aimed at carrying forward the works of his preceding Dalai Lama incarnate. On the basis of signs and symbolic appearances, as well as prophesies received from visions which appeared on the sacred Lhamo Latso lake in Tibet, he was recognised as the reincarnation of the preceding Dalai Lama. More strikingly, the recognition was reinforced by and confirmed beyond all doubts on the basis of the child’s instant remembrance of facts and events from his pre...