The international automobile giant, Mercedes Benz has issued an apology to the Chinese people for sharing a car picture featuring a quotation from His Holiness the Dalai Lama in their social media account. This is a continuation of the Chinese censorship enforcement upon the international companies dealing with China.
“Mercedes-Benz issued an apology in China on Tuesday for quoting the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan spiritual leader who is reviled by Beijing, on social media abroad in a reflection of foreign companies’ heightened sensitivity to the Communist government’s possible reaction to their global activities.” said the report in the Associated Press on Tuesday.
The quotation; “Look at situations from all angles, and you will become more open” from the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader His Holiness the Dalai Lama featured on a car picture shared by the Mercedes Instagram account. Soon the post was deleted by the company and it issued an apology letter in its Chinese social media account.
The luxury automobile company apologised for “wrong information hurt the feelings of Chinese people” without mentioning the name of the Tibetan leader who is highly censored by the Chinese government.
In the recent past, several multinational companies like the Marriott International, ZARA, Delta Air, etc., were also made to apologise for listing Tibet as a separate country and the Chinese government warned against all such multinational companies to review their information for dealing with China. No company disobeyed the directive from the communist government!
When China occupied Tibet in a military coupe in 1959 and declared it as an inseparable part of China, many Tibetans led by then the young Dalai Lama, fled into exile. Since then, China has declared the Nobel Peace laureate and a highly revered leader across the world as a separatist and remains highly sensitive about him while dealing western countries too.
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