BERLIN – Germany said Monday it regretted China’s cancellation of a second bilateral meeting following talks last month between Chancellor Angela Merkel and the Dalai Lama and hoped to reschedule soon.
The foreign ministry said at the weekend that Beijing had axed an annual event scheduled for December in Beijing to discuss human rights.
A foreign ministry spokeswoman, Julia Gross, declined Monday to discuss the reasons China gave but noted it was only the latest no-show by Beijing since Merkel’s talks with the exiled Tibetan leader September 23.
“I can only stress that we regret China’s cancellation. We also regret that after the cancellation of the talks on the rule of law that this is the second cancellation of forum for dialogue. We consider both of these forums very important,” she said.
“We will of course try again to arrange talks in this forum.”
According to the German news weekly Der Spiegel, the Chinese authorities cancelled the Beijing get-together due to Merkel’s meeting with the Dalai Lama at her chancellery in Berlin.
In the past, officials have used the high-ranking meeting to raise specific cases of arrests and ill treatment in China.
The historic Merkel-Dalai Lama meeting has provoked a diplomatic chill between the two nations.
Beijing already pulled out of a Germany-China symposium scheduled last month in Munich, citing “technical reasons.”
And talks between Chinese foreign minister Jian Yu and his German counterpart Frank-Walter Steinmeier during a meeting of the UN General Assembly in New York were also postponed at the last minute.
German deputy government spokesman Thomas Steg said Monday that Berlin considered maintaining the lines of communication as a top priority.
“We have made clear that we hope and expect China to also realize at a certain point how important regular dialogue between China and Germany is, that we have a great amount of common interests, overlapping interests and that it is reasonable to return to a form of regular dialogue including talks on the rule of law,” he said.
“We are not giving up hope that after a certain amount of time it will again be possible.”
Spiegel quoted diplomats in Beijing as saying that the Chinese government was “particularly outraged that Merkel did not mention her planned meeting (with the Dalai Lama) during her visit to China in August” and that it would have “lasting consequences.”
China, which claims to have liberated Tibet from feudal oppression with its occupation of the country in 1959, declared it an autonomous region in 1965.
