President Barack Obama met with the Dalai Lama at the White House on Friday, ignoring previous warnings from China that such a meeting would "severely impair" its relationship with the U.S, The Washington Post reported.
Obama met with the Dalai Lama, the 78-year-old Buddhist spiritual leader of Tibet, in the White Houses' Map Room. The two leaders last met during Obama's first term in 2011. Friday was the third time they have met, The Washington Post reported.
The Obama administration said on Thursday the meeting will go ahead as planned despite the threatened political implications.
"The president will meet with the Dalai Lama in his capacity as an internationally respected religious and cultural leader," National Security Council spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden said in a statement obtained by The Washington Post.
"The United States supports the Dalai Lama's 'middle way' approach of neither assimilation nor independence for Tibetans in China," Hayden said. "We will continue to urge the Chinese government to resume dialogue with the Dalai Lama or his representatives, without preconditions, as a means to reduce tensions."
A spokeswoman from China's foreign ministry said in a Thursday statement the U.S. should not meet with the Dalai Lama due to his anti-Chinese actions. Another statement was released on Friday, before the president met with the spiritual leader.
"The Dalai Lama is a political exile who has long been engaged in anti-China separatist activities under the cloak of religion," said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying, according to The Washington Post. "By arranging a meeting between the president and the Dalai Lama, the U.S. side will grossly interfere in the internal affairs of China, seriously violate norms governing international relations and severely impair China- U.S. relations."
China has long maintained that the Dalai Lama, a Nobel Peace Prize winner, is carrying out violent measures to gain Tibetan independence. China has also requested other countries not to meet with the Dalai Lama, even going so far as to cut back several diplomatic ties with Great Britain when the Dalai Lama visited in 2012, The Washington Post reported.
