Author: AFP
Publication: The Times of India
Date: September 25, 2007
China has cancelled a second toplevel meeting
with Germany, the German foreign ministry said on Monday, after Chancellor
Angela Merkel angered Beijing by receiving the Dalai Lama.
Foreign ministry spokesman Martin Jaeger said
Chinese foreign minister Yang Jiechi had cancelled a breakfast meeting with
his German counterpart Frank-Walter Steinmeier in New York this week.
The German government on Monday signalled
that it was trying to soothe diplomatic tensions with China triggered by the
Dalai Lama's visit and wants to reschedule a meeting with Chinese justice
officials that was meant to place on Sunday. The event was cancelled in apparent
retaliation for Merkel's decision to hold an historic meeting with the Dalai
Lama in Berlin on Sunday, becoming the first chancellor to receive the exiled
Tibetan spiritual and temporal leader.
Merkel used her talks with the Dalai Lama
to express support for his quest for cultural autonomy for Tibet, which Chinese
soldiers occupied in 1950.
