Dalai Lama and Nancy Pelosi

His Holiness the Dalai Lama is welcomed onto the stage at the MCI Center in Washington, DC, by Nancy Pelosi, at an event co-hosted by ICT in November 2005.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi took time away from the contentious debate over Iraq today to meet His Holiness the Dalai Lama in San Francisco, on the first stop of the Tibetan spiritual leader’s US trip. As leader of the new Democratic Congress, Speaker Pelosi took the opportunity to express her continued support for the current dialogue on Tibet’s future between the Dalai Lama’s representatives and Beijing, during a frank and warm conversation. Speaker Nancy Pelosi was the point person in Congress for many years in the debate over whether or not to grant China preferential trade status given the human rights situation in China and Tibet.

The Dalai Lama gives a public talk in San Francisco on Sunday (April 29) and then travels to Madison, Wisconsin. He will not be visiting Washington, DC, until later in the year, when he will receive the Congressional Gold Medal.