Dalai Lama calls on Beijing to address melting glaciers

The Dalai Lama has called on Beijing to address the issue of the melting of TIbet’s glaciers, which he sees as a bigger issue than Tibet’s political future, Reuters reported. Attending a UN summit on global hunger in Rome, the Dalai Lama warned that rivers from Tibet’s glaciers and snow-covered mountains may dry up in 15 to 20 years, and asked Beijing to study the problem together with Tibetan experts. "A political solution (for Tibet) may take time, but that’s okay, we can wait," the Dalai Lama told reporters. "But damaging the ecology, year by year, is happening, so we really need serious studies and to make a plan to protect the environment. That is very, very important." The Qinghai-Tibet Plateau is the source of many of Asia’s great rivers including the Yangtze and the Mekong.