Washington:
China has lashed out at the United States after President Barack Obama hosted the Dalai Lama at the White House. Beijing was clearly "dissatisfied" with the 70 minute-long meeting.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu in an official statement said, "The meeting between Obama and the Dalai Lama violated the U.S. government's repeated acceptance that Tibet is a part of China and it does not support Tibetan independence."
The Chinese government said it's now up to Washington to take steps to put bilateral relations back on a healthy course.
Beijing was not pacified by the fact that President Obama deliberately kept the meeting low key by sitting down with his fellow Nobel Peace Laureate in the Map Room rather than the Oval Office, where Presidents usually meet with international leaders.
Their talks were held entirely out of view of cameras. The White House only released just a single White House photo.
All these gestures were meant to tamper down China's displeasure that Obama was holding the meeting in the first place.
With Beijing considering the Buddhist monk a separatist, Obama did not want to overly anger China at a time when its cooperation is needed on nuclear standoffs with Iran and North Korea, climate change and other priorities.
US lawmakers and activists had accused Obama of buckling to China for not meeting the Dalai Lama when he came to Washington in October last year.
After the meeting, the exiled Tibetan leader said, "The President was very much supportive. And I thank, you see, even before he became President, during the election, he telephoned me, then after, he became President, you see, he always is showing his genuine concern and including his recent visit to Beijing, he expressed his concern about Tibet and besides other global issues like that. So, I expressed my thanks to him, so that's the main thing."
"We have ongoing concerns about human rights conditions among the Tibetan areas of China. At the same time, we consider Tibet to be a part of China but we will talk about those conditions and I think as the President stressed, we will continue to support the dialogue that has resumed recently between Tibet, be it Dalai Lama and China, and continue to encourage both sides to continue with that dialogue and continue to support cultural and rights of Tibetans within China," said PJ Crowley, US State Department Spokesman.