Published by: World Tibet Network News, Tuesday, August 13, 1996

LANZHOU (Aug. 13) XINHUA - A leading Tibetan living Buddha today defended the method used in the search for the soul boy of the Tenth Panchen Lama.

The Chinese Government painstakingly followed a procedure, not introduced in recent times, but established over 200 years ago by Qing Emperor Qian Long.

The emperor introduced the procedure in 1793 to eliminate fraud and to safeguard the interests of the Chinese government, said Jamyang Losang Jime Tubdain Qoigyi Nyima, the living Buddha of the Lapuleng Monastery in northwest China's Gansu Province.

He was laying down the historic account to stress his view that the Dalai Lama will never succeed in his plot to split China by continuing to take advantage of the question of the reincarnation of the Panchen Lama.

Even today some people abroad continue to make indiscreet comments on the question, and even go so far as to attack China, said Jamyang, who is the vice-president of the Buddhism Association of China.

"Meanwhile, the Dalai clique took advantage of this question to step up their activity to split China. We Tibetan monks and Tibetans are all indignant at this," he said.

He said that the search for the soul boy for the tenth Panchen Lama was completed long before. The 11th Panchen Lama was enthroned on December 8, 1995.

Jamyang, 48, who is also a vice-chairman of the Standing Committee of the Gansu Provincial People's Congress, said that the search and verification of the soul boy for the tenth Panchen Lama was a "very solemn and serious" event.

Three days after the death of the tenth Panchen Lama, the State Council, China's highest governing body, announced the decision to search the reincarnated boy of the Panchen Lama.

A group in charge of searching the soul boy was set up soon after, with living Buddhas and eminent monks from the Zhaxi Lhunbo Monastery in Tibet serving as principle members.