Author: Edward Wong
Publication: The New York Times
Date: February 2, 2010
A senior Chinese official strongly warned
President Obama on Tuesday against meeting with the Dalai Lama, the exiled
spiritual leader of the Tibetans, saying it would damage relations between
China and the United States.
The official, Zhu Weiqun, said any country
would suffer consequences if its leaders met with the Dalai Lama, whom China
considers to be a dangerous separatist. Mr. Zhu did not elaborate on what
actions China could take.
But a White House spokesman said the president's
plans were unchanged. "The president told China's leaders during his
trip last year that he would meet with the Dalai Lama, and he intends to do
so," said the spokesman, Bill Burton, speaking aboard Air Force One as
it flew Mr. Obama to New Hampshire for an event.
"To be clear," he added, "the
U.S. considers Tibet to be a part of China. We have human rights concerns
about the treatment of Tibetans. We urge the government of China to protect
the unique cultural and religious traditions of Tibet."
Last autumn, when the Dalai Lama visited the
United States, Mr. Obama declined to meet with him to avoid angering China
before Mr. Obama's trip to Beijing, in November.
Both Mr. Obama and the Dalai Lama are Nobel
Peace Prize laureates.
Mr. Zhu, who is the executive vice director
of the United Front Work Department, the arm of the Chinese Communist Party
that oversees ethnic policy, made his remarks at a morning news conference,
according to Xinhua, the state news agency. The purpose of the conference
was to give details on recent negotiations between the Chinese government
and envoys of the Dalai Lama, in which China rejected demands for greater
Tibetan autonomy.
Any move by American leaders to meet the Dalai
Lama will "harm others but bring no profit to itself, either," Mr.
Zhu said.
Despite Mr. Obama's earlier overtures to Beijing,
tensions between the United States and China have been on the rise.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton
recently chastised China in a speech she gave in which she denounced Internet
censorship. Last Friday, the United States announced sales of $6.4 billion
of arms to Taiwan, the self-governing island that China says is a rebel province.
In response, China said it would break off military-to-military ties with
the United States and impose sanctions against the American companies that
make the arms.
China usually criticizes any prominent figure
who meets with the Dalai Lama.
In 2007, despite furious objections from China,
President George W. Bush met privately with the Dalai Lama in Washington and
was present at a ceremony at which Congress awarded the exiled Tibetan leader
its highest civilian honor. China called the event a farce.
A decade earlier, President Bill Clinton informally
greeted the Dalai Lama at the White House and said he would urge China to
open talks with him, but the two leaders did not meet formally.
In 2008 China protested a meeting between
the Dalai Lama and President Nicolas Sarkozy of France. It hinted that it
would impose economic sanctions against France but never did.
China considers sovereignty issues like the
status of Tibet and Taiwan to be what officials call the nation's "core
interests." Few things anger the Chinese government more than the perceived
intervention of foreign countries in these matters. Tibet, always a thorny
foreign policy issue for the Communist Party, became even more so after an
uprising exploded across Tibetan regions of western China in March 2008.
The Dalai Lama, 74, lives in India and says
he wants only "genuine autonomy" for Tibet, not independence.
The latest meeting between his envoys and
Chinese officials ended over the weekend. It was the ninth round of talks
since 2002, and Chinese officials restated their rejection of the Dalai Lama's
call for greater autonomy for the Tibetans.
Mr. Zhu said Tuesday that the Dalai Lama was
not a legal representative of the six million Tibetans in China and that China
would discuss with the envoys only the status of the Dalai Lama, not the future
of Tibet.
Peter Baker contributed reporting from Nashua,
N.H.
