Toronto: China's envoy to Canada is calling the Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama "a slave owner" and "a serial liar". After the Chinese media called the Dalai Lama a "jackal with a human face and the heart of a beast", the Chinese ambassador to Canada has now described the Tibetan spiritual leader as being "a slave owner" and "a serial liar".

The envoy has also equated pre-1950 Tibet with "medieval Europe" and "Nazi Germany". In a television interview, Ambassador Lu Shumin said the Dalai Lama, who lives in India, "was the largest owner of a serfdom society and owner of slaves" before the Chinese troops moved into Tibet in 1950. He alleged that the Dalai Lama always wanted to break Tibet from China despite his professions to the contrary. "These are facts and no one can distort these facts, he said Monday. Lu said the Tibetan riots and demonstrations were part of the "Dalai clique's" plans to embarrass China before the Beijing Olympics.

"I think there is more and more evidence that this is pre-planned, it s pre-meditated, and organized by the separatist groups led by the Dalai clique, he said. But Wednesday, the ambassador went even a step further in his tirade against the Dalai Lama. At a press conference in Ottawa, Lu said the Tibetan spiritual leader was ``a serial liar who could not be trusted. ``The Dalai Lama has been telling lies to the world for decades, he said. Lu claimed that a German tourist to Tibet in the 1930s had described the Tibetan system there as akin to "Nazi rule" under Hitler.

Though the Canadian government, which officially hosted the Dalai Lama last year and has condemned the Chinese crackdown in Tibet, has not yet reacted to the ambassador's remarks, his language has infuriated many Canadians. ``The ambassador really has a 19th century mentality, which is the civilizing mission. You civilize the barbarians," history expert Timothy Brook of the University of British Columbia told the TV channel which interviewed the ambassador.

He said the Chinese envoy was distorting history when he was spreading the canards about the Dalai Lama being a slave owner. ``There were not slaves on a (Tibetan) plantation, he said. ``If I were the ambassador, I would be very careful about using language like that. It is neither historically accurate, nor is it a way to deal with the current situation, Brook added.

Source : IANS