A Tibetan youth named by China as the 11th Panchen Lama is too young to be a parliament deputy, a spokesman said, quashing speculation he would soon become the country's youngest Cabinet minister-level official.
China's atheist Communists and exiled Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, in 1995 chose rival reincarnations of the 10th Panchen Lama, the second-highest figure in Tibetan Buddhism.
Sources had said Beijing's choice, Gyaltsen Norbu, who turned 18 last month, could become a member of the elite Standing Committee of the National People's Congress as early as this month.
But parliamentary spokesman Jiang Enzhu (
"According to our country's laws and regulations, members of the National People's Congress must be at least 18 years old," Jiang told a news conference.
"As far as I know, the Panchen Lama was not yet 18 when elections ... were held. So he is not on the list of deputies this time," Jiang said.
China's state media have not mentioned elections and Jiang did not elaborate on when they took place.
Meanwhile, Icelandic singer Bjork ignited criticism from Chinese fans after she declared "Tibet! Tibet!" to end a passionate performance of her song Declare Independence during a concert in Shanghai.
The outburst at the finale of Bjork's Sunday night concert drew rare public attention inside China to Beijing's often harsh rule over the at times independent Himalayan region of Tibet.
Bjork's statement was not reported in state-controlled media, but online discussion boards were aflame with angry comments by users.
"If she really did this, then this woman really makes people throw up," one comment on the Chinese Web site Sina.com said.
One foreign national in the audience said that people didn't boo, but left the Shanghai International Gymnastic Center hurriedly.
A Zurich city councilor has apologized and reportedly sought police protection against threats after she fired a sport pistol at an auction poster of a 14th-century Madonna and child painting, and posted images of their bullet-ridden faces on social media. Green-Liberal party official Sanija Ameti, 32, put the images on Instagram over the weekend before quickly pulling them down. She later wrote on social media that she had been practicing shots from about 10m and only found the poster as “big enough” for a suitable target. “I apologize to the people who were hurt by my post. I deleted it immediately when I
The governor of Ohio is to send law enforcement and millions of dollars in healthcare resources to the city of Springfield as it faces a surge in temporary Haitian migrants. Ohio Governor Mike DeWine on Tuesday said that he does not oppose the Temporary Protected Status program under which about 15,000 Haitians have arrived in the city of about 59,000 people since 2020, but said the federal government must do more to help affected communities. On Monday, Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost directed his office to research legal avenues — including filing a lawsuit — to stop the federal government from sending
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for
Japan scrambled fighter jets after Russian aircraft flew around the archipelago for the first time in five years, Tokyo said yesterday. From Thursday morning to afternoon, the Russian Tu-142 aircraft flew from the sea between Japan and South Korea toward the southern Okinawa region, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said in a statement. They then traveled north over the Pacific Ocean and finished their journey off the northern island of Hokkaido, it added. The planes did not enter Japanese airspace, but flew over an area subject to a territorial dispute between Japan and Russia, a ministry official said. “In response, we mobilized Air Self-Defense