CAPE TOWN, Aug 21 (Reuter) - Tibet's spiritual leader and Nobel peace laureate, the Dalai Lama, called on Wednesday for the free world to help nations still fighting for human rights.

"If we accept that others have a right to peace and happiness equal to our own, do we not have a responsibility to help those in need ?" he told a packed Cape Town City Hall.

The Dalai Lama said disadvantaged people in certain African and Asian states wished to enjoy the rights won by citizens of Europe and the Americas.

"But of course it is just those people who are deprived of their human rights who are least able to speak for themselves.

"The responsibility, therefore, rests with those of us who enjoy such freedoms," he said.

The Dalai Lama fled to India from Tibet in 1959. He is a fierce critic of China's occupation of Tibet and has travelled extensively to call for support against Beijing. He heads a Tibetan government-in-exile in the Himalayan Indian town of Dharamsala.

The 1989 Nobel Peace prize winner is scheduled to meet President Nelson Mandela on Thursday.

Earlier on Wednesday he met South Africa's other Nobel Peace laureate, retired Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu. The two religious leaders spoke briefly to reporters, saying only that they were pleased to meet each other.

The Dalai Lama is in South Africa for a week-long visit at the invitation of the World Conference on Religion and Peace. He leaves on Saturday.

REUTER