The Dalai Lama will mark his 90th birthday this week by revealing the long-awaited plans for his succession.

The choice of a new spiritual leader for Tibetan Buddhists is "a matter of riveting interest not only for followers of his religion, but also China, India, and the United States, for strategic reasons", said Reuters.

How is the Dalai Lama chosen?
Finding a new Dalai Lama means "recognising the leader's reincarnated form", a process "shrouded in mysticism and little understood outside closed religious circles", said The Sunday Times.

By Tibetan tradition, after a Dalai Lama's death, senior monks begin the search for the infant they believe to be his reincarnation. This process involves "dream interpretation, inference from omens and ancient rituals, and pilgrimages to sacred sites".

The problem is that this search "can take years", said The Diplomat, "often leaving a spiritual and leadership vacuum" for Tibetan Buddhists.
So the 14th Dalai Lama is "rewriting the script". He has indicated that he may "emanate" to another person while still alive, and that this person could be adult and not necessarily a man.

What role could China play?
"China is determined to shape the narrative around this succession, to prevent the erosion of its grip on Tibet", which it annexed in the 1950s, said Bloomberg. 

The Chinese Communist Party is expected to try to hijack the succession, as it did in 1995 when it put up its own candidate for Panchen Lama, the second highest figure in Tibetan Buddhism. The Dalai Lama's choice, six-year-old Gedhun Choekyi Nyima, was detained by Chinese officials and has not been seen since.

What about those in Tibet?
But "there are significant risks for China, too", said The Economist. Despite denouncing the current Dalai Lama as a separatist "wolf in monk's robes”, Beijing has tried to "revive back-channel talks" in recent years and to persuade him to return to Tibet. "Without him, the Tibetan movement could fragment and embrace a more radical drive for complete independence."

For Tibetans, the Dalai Lama's succession plan "will illuminate the real challenge ahead: how to preserve their identity after the man who embodies it is gone".

There's something "thrilling" about looking down at a "perfectly plump strawberry" atop your dessert at dinner and knowing it was picked just steps from the table, said Lizzie Frainier in The Times. 

The UK is home to an array of beautiful hotels that have a kitchen garden brimming with fresh produce, from broad beans to radishes. Here's our pick of the best.

Le Manoir aux Quat'Saisons, Oxfordshire
Raymond Blanc's luxury hotel and two-Michelin-starred restaurant has "one of the most revered vegetable gardens in the world", said The Telegraph. The two-acre plot is a "riot" of veg and herbs, spanning everything from heritage squash to Swiss chard and leeks. belmond.com

Cowley Manor, Gloucestershire
This 19th century manor house near Cheltenham underwent an extensive refurb in 2023 to cater to a "cool young crowd", said House & Garden. Head chef Jackson Boxer has crafted an ever-changing menu using plenty of vegetables and herbs from the hotel's kitchen garden.
cowlyemanorexperimental.com

Gravetye Manor, West Sussex
Once home to the revered Irish horticulture writer William Robinson, this "Elizabethan gem" is now a charming country house hotel, said Condé Nast Traveller. "The garden works in symbiosis with the Michelin-starred kitchen", where head chef George Blogg builds "exquisitely beautiful" plates of food around fresh produce from the kitchen garden. gravetyemanor.co.uk

The Newt, Somerset
Set amid apple orchards ("for all that crisp cider") and lush green gardens, this "eco-chic" hotel is perfect for a foodie break, said House & Garden. Both The Garden Cafe and the Botanical Room restaurant make full use of the "extensive" kitchen garden. Highlights from the veg-focused menu include chilled courgette soup, pea risotto and a strawberry and elderflower fool. thenewtinsomerset.com

When the Devil drives: Ukraine will deploy a truly horrible weapon
Tim Collins in The Telegraph
Ukraine's decision to withdraw from the Mine Ban Treaty is "no surprise given the gravity" of the situation facing the "embattled" country, writes former British Army officer Tim Collins. Anti-personnel landmines maim and kill soldiers, children and other non-combatants and "often render stretches of land unusable for many years", but as a means of defence, "they are extremely effective". And with Russia's "widespread use" of mines "of all sorts", it "increasingly looks nonsensical" to have the "significant disadvantage" of adhering to the treaty. 

Bob Vylan and Kneecap row shows the right's hypocrisy on free speech
Yasmin Alibhai-Brown in The i Paper
"Oh my," writes Yasmin Alibhai-Brown. "Israel and its supporters are stunned and affronted" and there's a "chorus of severe disapproval" after the "Death, death to the IDF" chants at Glastonbury. But "witness the double standards" of the right's "free speech advocates", who should "celebrate these summer sites of liberty" but instead seek "controlled free speech". The backlash will have a "chilling effect, but only briefly", because no one can "stop young people from saying what they think".

Don't diss dating apps – I'm still using them
Blanca Schofield in The Times
"Can I inject a glimmer of positivity by defiantly standing up" for dating apps, writes Blanca Schofield, because I feel like I'm the "only one who isn't pooh-poohing Hinge and Tinder". Such apps mean "life as a single young woman is less stressful". I can "forget about dating most of the time and focus on my job, hobbies, friends and family". And if a resulting relationship doesn't work, the "lack of mutual friends" means the break-up is "less complicated".