Beijing, April 22:

China’s Foreign Ministry today protested a meeting between a US official and the Dalai Lama as interference in its internal affairs.

The rebuke came one day after Undersecretary of State Paula Dobriansky met with the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader to discuss recent anti-government protests in Tibet’s capital, Lhasa, and in Tibetan communities in Western China.

“This is a serious violation of the basic norms of international relations and interference into our internal affairs,” ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said at a regularly scheduled news conference.

“We urge the US side to stop indulging and supporting the Dalai clique in its separatist activities so as not to harm our bilateral relations and the image of the US itself,” Jiang said at the news conference.

China accuses supporters of the Dalai Lama of orchestrating a March 14 riot in Lhasa, in which it says 22 people were killed.

Tibetan activists deny Beijing’s accusations and say more than 140 have been killed in all.