Tibetan government-in-exile leader Lobsang Sangay revealed that the U.S. White House invited him to meet with Robert Destro, the newly appointed U.S. Special Coordinator for Tibet and Assistant Secretary of the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor at the U.S. State Department. This will be the first visit to the U.S. White House by a leader of the Tibetan government-in-exile in 60 years, Reuters said.
The leader of the Tibetan government-in-exile was invited to the White House for the first time in 60 years, according to a news report cited by the Lianhe Zaobao today. The news report said that the leader of the Tibetan government-in-exile visited the U.S. White House for the first time in 60 years, a move that could further anger Beijing, which accuses the United States of trying to destabilize the region.
According to Reuters, Lobsang Sangay, the leader of the Tibetan government-in-exile, revealed in a press release yesterday that he was invited by the White House to meet with Robert Destro, the newly appointed U.S. Special Coordinator for Tibet and Assistant Secretary of State in the State Department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor.
U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in July accused Beijing of human rights violations in Tibet and said Washington supports “meaningful autonomy” for the region. Pompeo said in a statement last month that Destro “will lead U.S. efforts to facilitate dialogue between the People’s Republic of China and the Dalai Lama or his representatives; to protect the unique religious, cultural, and linguistic identity of Tibetans; and to promote respect for their human rights.
According to the report, Beijing officials counter-accused the United States of using Tibet to promote “separatism” in China and refused to engage with Destro. In response, China’s Foreign Ministry criticized the U.S. creation of the “special coordinator for Tibetan affairs” as a political maneuver designed to interfere in China’s internal affairs and destabilize the development of Tibet, and accused Lobsang Senge of being an “anti-China separatist” and condemned his meeting with Destro.
According to the report, the appointment comes at a time when trade war, the Taiwan crisis, human rights, the South China Sea, and the coronary virus have brought U.S.-China relations to a frosty point, which was expected to anger China.
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