China has warned Taiwan against allowing the Dalai Lama to visit the country, saying it will have a “severe impact on relations” between the two countries, Reuters reported on Wednesday. A spokesperson for China’s Taiwan Affairs Office told reporters that Beijing will “firmly oppose any form of visit” by the Tibetan spiritual leader to the island nation.
The Dalai Lama “wears religious clothes to carry our separatist activities”, said Ma Xiaoguang, adding that it was the “intention of some forces in Taiwan to collude with separatists seeking ‘Tibet independence’”. The remarks came after Taiwanese legislator Freddy Lim invited the exiled spiritual leader to visit the island nation after meeting with him in India last week.
Lim’s assistant said the legislator, who is a critic of Beijing, said the Dalai Lama was highly respected in Taiwan. Meanwhile, a Taiwan Foreign Ministry spokesperson said the country’s government will handle the Tibetan leader’s visa “based on relevant rules” if he submitted an application.
Relations between the two countries deteriorated after the Democratic Progressive Party-led government in Taipei refused to recognise the “one China” principle (according to which there is only one state called China). In June, Beijing stopped a communication mechanism with its island neighbour over the matter. The Dalai Lama fled to India in 1959 after a failed uprising in Tibet against Chinese rule. He has called for genuine autonomy for the Himalayan region.
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