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Dalai Lama arriving to meet US President
Barack Obama
(Photo:
Reuters) |
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Washinton: US President Barack
Obama was set to host the Dalai Lama at the White House on Thursday
despite China's warning that the meeting with the exiled Tibetan
spiritual leader could further damage strained ties.
Obama's first
presidential meeting with the Dalai Lama is sure to draw angry
complaints from Beijing, which is increasingly at odds with
Washington over trade, currencies, US arms sales to Taiwan and
Internet censorship.
With the two giant
economies so deeply intertwined, tensions are considered unlikely to
escalate into outright confrontation. The White House expects only
limited fallout.
But the Dalai
Lama's visit could complicate Obama's efforts to secure China's help
on key issues such as imposing tougher sanctions on Iran, resolving
the North Korean nuclear standoff and forging a new global accord on
climate change.
By going ahead
with the meeting over Chinese objections, Obama may be trying to
show his resolve against an increasingly assertive Beijing after
facing criticism at home for being too soft with China's leaders on
his trip there in November.
"Chinese officials
have known about this and their reaction is their reaction," White
House spokesman Robert Gibbs said dismissively on the eve of the
Dalai Lama's visit.
Although admired
by millions around the world as a man of peace, the Dalai Lama is
accused by Beijing of being a dangerous separatist who foments
unrest in Tibet.
Gibbs insisted the
United States and China — the world's largest and third-biggest
economies — have a "mature relationship" capable of withstanding
disagreements.
But mindful of
Chinese sensitivities, the White House has sought to strike a
balance in the Dalai Lama's visit. It comes on the heels of a US
plan to sell $6.4 billion of weapons to Taiwan, which China
considers a renegade province.
Seeking to avoid
alienating Beijing, Obama had delayed meeting the Dalai Lama until
after first seeing Chinese leaders during his Asia trip last year, a
snub that drew criticism from US lawmakers and human rights groups.
During Thursday's
visit, Obama will not appear in public with the Dalai Lama and —
like his White House predecessors — will deny him the symbolism of
meeting in the Oval Office. Such distinctions will signal to Beijing
that the Tibetan monk is not being received as a political leader.
But honoring the
Dalai Lama could still help Obama burnish his administration's
credentials among human rights activists, who accuse him of focusing
on global issues with Beijing at the expense of promoting Chinese
democratic reforms.
Zhu Weiqun, a vice
minister of the United Front Work Department of China's ruling
Communist Party, warned earlier this month that an Obama meeting
with the Dalai Lama "would damage trust and cooperation between our
two countries." The Obama administration ignored China's call to
scrap the talks.
Adding to
tensions, Obama vowed recently to address currency issues with
Beijing and to "get much tougher" with it on trade. Washington
complains that China keeps its currency undervalued, hurting the
competitiveness of American goods.
While China has
threatened to impose sanctions against US companies and curtail
military-to-military contacts over the Taiwan arms sale, Washington
expects the response to the Dalai Lama visit to be less threatening.
"There is no
reason why the reaction this time should be very different from what
it's been in the past, which has been they criticize it and then we
move on with other aspects of the relationship," a senior
administration official said.
Still, China has
become bolder, spurred not only by its economic clout but a sense in
Beijing that the global economic crisis exposed the weakness of
US-style capitalism.
Senior Chinese
military officers, for example, have proposed their country boost
defense spending and possibly sell some US bonds to punish
Washington for the Taiwan arms sale.
But against this
backdrop, Chinese authorities allowed the US aircraft carrier Nimitz
to sail into Hong Kong on schedule on Wednesday, an apparent signal
of the limits of Beijing's anger.
China did trim its
stockpile of US Treasuries to $755.4 billion in November, US
government data shows, an indication Beijing may at least be willing
to act on its concerns about Washington's economic stewardship.
But China remains
the second-biggest creditor to the United States, only slightly
behind Japan.
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