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China opposes Dalai Lama visit to Taiwan

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In this image taken on 16 August 2009, released by the Taiwan Presidential Office and made available 17 August 2009, Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou comforts the mother of a pilot who was killed while on a rescue mission during Typhoon Morakot earlier this month. Ma’s office has agreed to allow the Dalai Lama to visit Taiwan but China has said it is resolutely opposed to the proposed visit.File photo/Taiwan Presidential Office

The Chinese government has said it “resolutely opposes” the proposed visit of the Dalai Lama to Taiwan “in whatever form and capacity,” Xinhua, the Chinese state-run media reported, quoting a government spokesman.

Taiwan has approved the visit of the exiled Tibetan leader to comfort victims of Typhoon Morakot that struck the island earlier this month.

“The Dalai Lama is not a pure religious figure,” Xinhua quoted an unnamed spokesman for the State Council Taiwan Affairs Office.

“Under the pretext of religion, he (the Dalai Lama) has all along been engaged in separatist activities.”

The move is likely to strain Taiwan’s relations with mainland China, although the two sides had seen major advances in the relationship following the election of a more pro-Beijing government led by Ma ying-jeou in May 2008.

About 650 people are feared dead after the typhoon, which was the island’s worst in 50 years, ravaged Taiwan from 7-9 August.

Seven DPP mayors and magistrates from southern Taiwan, belonging to the opposition Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which promotes formal independence for Taiwan, extended the invitation to the Dalai Lama.

Details of the visit were still being worked out.

However, a Taiwanese government spokesman said, “Beijing will be a little uncomfortable, but if they understand how severe the disaster is they will show some respect to Taiwan’s people.”

China claims sovereignty over Taiwan, where the Nationalist Kuomintang forces fled after the Communist victory in the civil war in 1949, and has threatened to reclaim the island by force if necessary.

Although Ma has met the Tibetan leader on his previous visits to the self-ruled island nation when he was the mayor of Taipei, he refused to allow Dalai Lama to the island last year, saying the timing was not right.

It is unknown if they would meet again this time.

The Dalai Lama has visited Taiwan twice in the past, in 1997 followed by a second visit in 2001, when Chen Shui-bian of pro-independence for the island was president.

China brands the Dalai Lama as a separatist and reacts angrily to any country or leader hosting him.

He fled into exile in 1959 after a failed uprising against Chinese rule, nine years after Chinese troops invaded Tibet.

With inputs taken from agencies

Copyright © 2009 Tibet Sun

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