Paris — Penpa Tsering, President of the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) met Emmanuel Macron, President of France, at a ceremony to award the Légion d'honneur to André Gattolin, a former French senator and a very good friend of Tibet.
Sikyong Tsering urged President Macron not to forget Tibet during their meeting in Paris, the capital of France, marking it as the first time a top European leader has met with a top elected Tibetan political leader.
Sikyong (President) of the CTA, attended the ceremony to award the Légion d'honneur to André Gattolin, a former French senator and very good friend of Tibet, on April 30, 2024. During the ceremony, Sikyong met President Emmanuel Macron and presented him with a signed photo of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Emmanuel Macron in September 2016, when he was a candidate in the 2017 presidential election.
Chinese President Xi Jinping will visit France, early May 2024, to meet Emmanuel Macron, President of the French Republic. Therefore, Sikyong urged President Macron not to forget about Tibet during the meeting with the President.
Sikyong Penpa Tsering, the democratically elected leader of the Tibetan people in exile, has begun a tour of five countries, including Switzerland and France. He met parliamentarians and senior officials from these countries, explained the critical human rights situation in Tibet and asked for their support in the Tibetan struggle and in resolving the Tibet-China issue.
The National Order of the Legion of Honour, formerly the Royal Order of the Legion of Honour, is France's highest order of merit, both military and civil. It was established by the French emperor Napoleon Bonaparte in 1802 and has been maintained by all subsequent French governments and regimes.
Honorable André Gattolin was a former member of the French Senate, Vice-Chair of the Foreign Affairs and Defence Committee and Vice-Chairman of the European Affairs Committee. He was vice-President of the International Information Group on Tibet and of the French Senate's Senate-Taiwan study and exchange group. He is actively involved in promoting human rights, particularly in South-East Asia and Tibet.
Since 2016, Gattolin has chaired the French Senate's France-Northern Europe (Denmark, Iceland, Norway, Sweden) parliamentary friendship group. On behalf of the European Affairs Committee, he is the author of three reports on the geopolitics of the Arctic. Author and co-author of two French Senate reports on China in September 2021.
