China threatens to retaliate after Slovakian President meets Dalai Lama

By Lobsang Tenchoe

DHARAMSALA, Oct 18: Angered by Slovakian President’s meeting with His Holiness the Dalai Lama, China has threatened to retaliate.

The Tibetan spiritual leader, who is visiting Europe, met with Slovakian President Andrej Kiska in Bratislava, the Slovak capital on Sunday. The latter hosted the Tibetan Noble Peace laureate for a lunch meeting.

Following their meeting, the Tibetan leader addressed the Slovakians at the National Tennis Center.

“I’ve just had lunch with your marvelous President. We talked about how politics can often become dirty, but he told me that what he really wants is to serve the people. We found we have a lot in common. We talked about how existing education systems focus on material goals with too little attention to inner values. There needs to be a more holistic approach. I mentioned to him that a curriculum to enable young people to learn more about universal values is being prepared,” His Holiness said in his address.

“Kiska had ignored China’s ‘strong opposition’ to the meeting, which was contrary to the ‘one China’ policy the Slovak government has promised to uphold,” Reuters quoted Hua Chunying, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman as saying in its report, Oct 17.

The Chinese Spokeswomen further expressed Beijing’s resolute objection to the meeting and guaranteed a similar reprisal.

“Dalai Lama has long tried to separate Tibet from China and the government opposes any foreign official having any form of contact with him. The meeting has “broken the political basis of China-Slovak relations”, Hua said in the same report.

President Kiska has co-founded a charitable trust called Dobr’y and donates his monthly presidential salary to people in need.