Last Message from Buddhist Patriarch Thích Quảng Độ on religious freedom, democracy and human rights

PARIS, 11th March 2020 (VCHR-IBIB): In remembrance of the Most Venerable Thích Quảng Độ, renowned dissident and Patriarch of the Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam (UBCV) who died in Saigon last month, the Vietnam Committee on Human Rights (VCHR) and the International Buddhist Information Bureau (IBIB) wish to present the video (see in the original post) with the UBCV Patriarch’s last message to the international community.

The UBCV Patriarch sent his message clandestinely from the Thanh Minh Zen Monastery in Saigon, where he was under house arrest, to the international conference on “Freedom of Religion or Belief and Human Rights: Vietnamese and Tibetan Buddhism under threat”, organised by VCHR and the International Campaign for Tibet in Washington D.C. on 11th July 2018 at the US Commission on International Religious Freedom.

In this moving message, spoken in English, Thích Quảng Độ expressed solidarity between Vietnamese and Tibetan Buddhists suffering oppression under communist regimes, and stressed his life-long conviction that religious freedom, democracy and human rights are indivisible and interdependent: “Buddhists in Vietnam and Tibet share so much. We walk the same path of nonviolence and peace. We believe that compassion can overcome hatred, and we strive to free the world from suffering, ignorance and oppression. We also share the same punishment, torture and detention from governments that are determined to stifle our voice.

“Religious freedom is like a flower. It needs water, sunlight and good earth for its seeds to flourish and grow. Without them, it will die. Without freedom of expression, assembly, association – in brief, without democracy and human rights, religious freedom cannot be guaranteed. This is why we Buddhists keep speaking out for freedom, whatever the price”.

This was the last time Thích Quảng Độ publicly addressed the international community. Two months later, in September 2018, he was expelled from the Thanh Minh Zen Monastery by its superior monk who said his presence caused “political and economic problems.”  In October 2018, he travelled to his home village in northern Vietnam, but on arriving there found himself under a new form of house arrest. He managed to escape from the North and came back to the Từ Hiếu Pagoda in Saigon, but he remained under close surveillance, deprived of all means of communication and isolated from his close followers until his death on 22 February 2020 at the age of 93 (his age according to the lunar calendar).

Source: VCHR