Mosquitos more worthy of mercy than bin Laden: Dalai Lama

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The Dalai Lama, the leader of Tibetan Buddhism, implied at a talk that the Obama administration’s targeted killing of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was justified.

During a talk at the University of Southern California Tuesday, the Dalai Lama was asked about bin Laden’s killing, and whether that could be rationalized in the context of Buddhism’s dharma of forgiveness and compassion.

“Forgiveness doesn’t mean forget what happened,” he said, according to the LA Times. “If something is serious and it is necessary to take counter-measures, you have to take counter-measures.”

In the same talk, titled “Secular Ethics, Human Values and Society,” the Dalai Lama also said he tries to avoid killing mosquitos when they land on him, “when my mood is good and there is no danger of malaria.”