Board of Trustees
Ringu Tulku Rinpoche is a Tibetan Buddhist Master of the Kagyu Order. He was trained in all schools of Tibetan Buddhism under many great masters including His Holiness the 16th Gyalwang Karmapa and HH Dilgo Khentse Rinpoche. He took his formal education at the Namgyal Institute of Tibetology, Sikkim and Sampurnananda Sanskrit University, Varanasi, India and served as Tibetan Textbook Writer and Professor of Tibetan Studies in Sikkim for 25 years.
Since 1990 he has been travelling and intensively teaching Buddhism and Meditation, across the world at Universities, Institutes and Buddhist Centres.
He has also participated in various Interfaith and Science and Buddhist dialogues. He authored several books on Buddhism as well as some children’s books both in Tibetan and European languages.
Ringu Tulku Rinpoche is the Official Representative of His Holiness the 17th Karmapa for Europe and the Founder of KFE.
Inès Wouters is responsible for the activities of the Bodicharya office in Brussels including the visits of Ringu Tulku Rinpoche.
She has contributed to the translations of many Buddhist texts into French including the book of Ringu Tulku Rinpoche :“Et si vous m’expliquiez le bouddhisme ? Les principes fondamentaux du bouddhisme tibétain”
Inès is a Barrister in Brussels, specialising in religious liberty, philosophical and economic law. She is also specialised in tax law, particularly international tax law; the taxation of small and medium-sized enterprises; donations and inheritance, and international commercial contracts and human rights.
She is also an administrator in Trans European Law Firms Alliance (TEFLA).
Born in 1953, Carlo Luyckx took Refuge in Samye Ling, Scotland, with Akong Rinpoche in 1971. On the occasion of the second European visit of His Holiness the 16th Gyalwang Karmapa in 1977, he co-founded the Kagyu Samye Dzong Brussels Centre, for which he is still Executive Vice-President. From 1977 till 1984, he studied Thangka painting with Sherab Palden Beru, one of the main lineage holders of the Karma Gardri art tradition.
At the age of 30, he went to university and obtained a master’s degree in Political Sciences and International Relations, as well as a master’s degree inInternational Law. After a first job as Deputy Director of the International Insurance Brokers’Bureau (BIPAR, 1989-1990), he became advisor to the Minister-President of the Brussels-Capital Region, in order to set up the Brussels-Europe Liaison Office, of which he became Director General until 2015. He was also General Secretary of the European Movement-Belgium from 1992 until 2000 and Deputy General Secretary of the International European Movement from 1995 until 1997.
In 1995, Carlo was elected a member of the City Council of Saint-Gilles-Brussels (50.000 inhabitants). He was elected Deputy Mayor in 2000 and reelected until 2018. As president of the Belgian Buddhist Union since 2014, he strives to have Buddhism officially recognized by the Belgian Government. In 2021 he became the Representative of the European Buddhist Union (EBU) to the European institutions in Brussels and in 2023 he was elected Vice-President of the EBU.
Carlo is author of the chapter on Akong Rinpoche’s activity in Belgium of the book “Only the Impossible is Worth Doing”, Dzalendara publishing, Scotland, UK, 2020, as well as of the book “Integrity in Politics: a Utopia?” with a foreword by H.H. the Dalai Lama and a preface by Matthieu Ricard, Edition du Lys Bleu, Paris, France, 2022.
