Dalai Lama Says He’ll Return Soon to Tibet : Buddhism: The spiritual leader’s announcement poses a new political challenge for China.

The Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism, announced Wednesday his intention to return for the first time to the homeland he fled as a young ruler during Tibet’s abortive rebellion against Chinese rule in 1959.

In a speech at Yale University, the Tibetan leader said he wants to visit Tibet as soon as possible to “communicate directly with my people.” His announcement poses a new political challenge for China, raising the prospect that it could face along its western borders some of the nationalist pressures that forced the breakup of the Soviet Union.

Over the last decade, the mere arrival of the Dalai Lama’s emissaries in Lhasa, the Tibetan capital, or the display of pictures of the Buddhist leader has been enough to touch off public outpourings of religious fervor. One U.S. analyst said Wednesday that any return of the Dalai Lama to Tibet “would be tumultuous, to say the least.”

The Tibetan leader, 56, who now lives in exile in India, left unexplained how he might go back home--particularly if, as is likely, China objects.

Hao Guangfeng, a spokesman for the Chinese Embassy in Washington, declined to comment. He referred a reporter to a policy statement by the Chinese government two weeks ago demanding that the Dalai Lama “stop his activities aimed at splitting the country and abandon his position for ‘the independence of Tibet.’ ”

Wednesday’s speech represents a new, tougher and more confrontational stance by the Dalai Lama, who had been trying for more than a decade to negotiate some form of political accommodation with the Chinese leadership.

Three years ago, during an address to the European Parliament in Strasbourg, France, the Dalai Lama proposed that Tibet become autonomous under Chinese rule, with a democratic Tibetan government responsible for Tibet’s internal affairs and the Chinese regime in Beijing responsible for foreign policy.

Now, the Tibetan leader said, he has decided to abandon this conciliatory approach--thus implicitly raising the possibility that in the future he could advocate Tibetan independence.

“Chinese leaders rejected (the plan for Tibetan autonomy) and refused to enter into negotiations,” he said Wednesday, speaking from a prepared text. “Moreover, many Tibetans, in exile and in Tibet, were strongly opposed to the proposals, which they felt contained unnecessary concessions to the Chinese. It is therefore clear that the Strasbourg proposal can no longer serve any useful purpose.”

However, the Dalai Lama, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989, also emphasized in his speech Wednesday that he still advocates nonviolence and remains open to talks with China. Once before, during the early 1980s, representatives of the Dalai Lama visited China and tried unsuccessfully to negotiate a political deal with the Chinese regime that would have allowed the Dalai Lama’s return to Tibet.

“My ability to talk to my own people can be a key factor in bringing about a peaceful solution,” he declared. “My visit could be a new opportunity to promote understanding and create a basis for a negotiated solution.”

The government in Beijing contends that Tibet has always been part of Chinese territory. But the Dalai Lama and other Tibetans maintain that never throughout the last 2,000 years have Tibetans acknowledged Chinese sovereignty.

After the downfall of China’s Qing Dynasty in 1911, Tibet enjoyed de facto independence (but not international diplomatic recognition) for nearly four decades, until China’s Communist revolution of 1949. The following year, Chinese troops occupied Tibet. On March 21, 1959, disguised in peasant’s garb, the Dalai Lama left his summer palace outside Lhasa and, with the help of the CIA, fled to India.

There are more than 6 million Tibetan Buddhists. Many of them now live outside the borders of China’s Tibet Autonomous Region because China has incorporated some of the land inhabited by Tibetans into the adjoining provinces of Sichuan and Qinghai.

Unlike the Baltic states of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, Tibet has never been recognized by the United States as an independent country. Last April, President Bush became the first American President to meet the Dalai Lama, inviting him to a private White House session that spokesman Marlin Fitzwater said was held because of his role as a religious leader.

China’s statement two weeks ago said the government in Beijing “hopes that the Dalai Lama will return from exile to China at an early date.” However, in the past, Chinese authorities repeatedly have insisted that the Dalai Lama should return to Beijing, not the Tibetan capital of Lhasa, and that any visit to Tibet should be made under conditions carefully controlled by China.

On Wednesday, however, the Dalai Lama said his visit to Tibet “can, of course, only take place if Tibetans are permitted to meet with me and speak freely with me, without fear of retaliation. For my part, I must be free to travel wherever I want and to meet with any Tibetan I wish to meet.”

And he added, “It would be important . . . for senior Chinese leaders to accompany me on such a visit and that outside observers, including the press, be present to see and report the findings.”