![[FILE] The 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso, greets Buddhist devotees at a monastery in Zanskar in the Kargil district of Ladakh Union Territory, India, 21 July 2025. EFE/EPA/FAROOQ KHAN](https://i0.wp.com/efe.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/rss-efef38fb1f8a64a133cd762bb7c5dc52031673343fdw.webp?fit=1920%2C1237&ssl=1)
New Delhi, Feb 8 (EFE).- The Dalai Lama’s office on Sunday categorically denied any connection between the Tibetan spiritual leader and the late US financier Jeffrey Epstein, after newly declassified American court records contained repeated references to his name.
“Some recent media reports and social media posts concerning the ‘Epstein files’ are attempting to link His Holiness the Dalai Lama with Jeffrey Epstein,” the Dalai Lama office said in a statement.
“We can unequivocally confirm that His Holiness has never met Jeffrey Epstein or authorized any meeting or interaction with him by anyone on His Holiness’s behalf.”
The clarification from the office of Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama, follows the release of US federal documents in which members of his administrative circle are mentioned more than 150 times, according to an EFE review.
The declassified files indicate that in 2012 a budget of $1 million was allocated to renovate a residence intended to host the Dalai Lama and an entourage of 15 people for a two-week stay.
In an Oct. 21, 2012 email, Epstein wrote that he was going to attend an event on an unnamed island, which the Dalai Lama would attend.
“Yes. First step would be to meet Tenzin. His student who runs the Dalai Lama center and is now a Director’s Fellow at the Lab and going to start the ‘ethics initiative’ at the Media Lab,” reads another email sent to Epstein on May 10, 2015.
“We’re working on some cool things like a meeting about cognitive machines and man. I think you’ll probably like him. He can get us the Dalai Lama.”
The documents also reference the use of Epstein’s private aircraft network for travel related to the Tibetan leader that same year, as well as events in which the financier expressed his intention to meet him.
An email sent by Epstein in October 2012 underscores his personal involvement in the logistics.
In later correspondence, dated 2015, Epstein claimed he was “working” to attract Nobel Peace Prize recipients to private dinners and told partners that his academic contacts could “get the Dalai Lama.”
However, EFE has verified that more than 130 of the references in the documents are generic mentions, including press articles, Buddhist teachings, or lists of prominent international figures compiled by Epstein, rather than evidence of direct contact. EFE
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