DHAKA: Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi has risked prompting Chinese anger after it was confirmed she had a private meeting with the Dalai Lama on the sidelines of a Prague rights conference.

Beijing has for decades opposed foreign dignitaries meeting Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader, who fled his homeland for India in 1959 after a failed uprising against Chinese rule.

‘They met on Sunday at the Dalai Lama’s lecture,’ Filip Sebek, spokesman for the Forum 2000 foundation that organises the conference, told media on Monday, specifying that the two Nobel Peace laureates met in private, reports The Straits Times.

Beijing, a powerful Myanmar ally and major investor in the resource-rich nation, has branded the Dalai Lama an anti-China ‘separatist’ who encourages violence.

BDST: 1922 HRS, SEPT 16, 2013
RoR/GCP