McCartney wrote to the Tibetan spiritual leader to point out that meat-eaters contribute to the suffering of animals, contradicting the latter's statement that Buddhists "believe in not causing suffering to any sentient beings".

Contactmusic.com reports McCartney as saying: "I found out that he was not a vegetarian, so I wrote to him saying 'Forgive me for pointing this out, but if you eat animals then there is some suffering somewhere along the line'.

"He replied saying that his doctors had told him he needed it, so I wrote back saying they were wrong."