Exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama said on Wednesday that he would visit U.S.
President-elect Donald Trump, a meeting that would infuriate Beijing which views the Nobel Peace Prize-winning monk as a
dangerous separatist.

Speaking during a visit to Mongolian capital Ulaanbaatar and asked about the U.S. election, the Dalai Lama said he had always
considered the United States a "leading nation of the free world".

"I think there are some problems to go to United States, so Iwill go to see the new president," he told reporters, without
elaborating.

President Barack Obama met the Dalai Lama at the White House in June despite a warning by China that it would damage
diplomatic relations, Obamas fourth White House meeting with the Dalai Lama in the past eight years.

The Dalai Lama, speaking in English, brushed off some of the U.S. election campaign rhetoric.

"Sometimes I feel during election the candidate has more freedom to express. Once elected, having the responsibility,
then they have to tell you their sort of vision, their works according to reality."

China regards the Dalai Lama as a separatist, though he says he merely seeks genuine autonomy for his Himalayan homeland
Tibet, which Communist Chinese troops "peacefully liberated" in 1950.

China has been angered by Mongolias decision to allow him to visit, though Mongolias Foreign Ministry said in a statement
to the Montsame news agency that the government had nothing to do with the trip, which they said was arranged by Mongolian
Buddhists.

After the Dalai Lamas visit to Mongolia in 2006, China briefly cancelled flights between Beijing and Ulaanbaatar.

Beijing frequently expresses its anger with countries that host the Dalai Lama, who fled to India in 1959 following a
failed uprising against the Chinese.

Rights groups and exiles accuse China of trampling on the religious and cultural rights of the Tibetan people, charges
strongly denied by Beijing, which says its rule has brought prosperity to a once backward region, Reuters reported.

Source: ANTARA