BEIJING: Tibetan spiritual leader Dalai Lama's attempts to "split" China are "doomed to fail", said an official following a string of self-immolations in recent months.
The Dalai Lama clique's separatist activities will fail as self-immolations in a small number of monasteries can not disrupt the stability-developing trend in the Tibetan-populated regions, China's official news agency quoted Li Changping, a member of the standing committee of the Sichuan Committee of the Communist Party of China, as saying Wednesday.
"The Dalai Lama clique have made more attempts to split China, a few monks and nuns in the Tibetan-populated regions echoed them at a distance. But these people can neither represent all Tibetans nor stop the stably-developing trend in these regions," said Li at a panel discussion open to press during the ongoing legislative meeting.
A string of self-immolations broke out in Tibetan areas in the provinces of Sichuan and Qinghai bordering Tibet in recent months. And at least two mob attacks on police offices were reported in Sichuan's volatile Tibetan areas in late January, leaving two people dead and more than a dozen injured.
China has blamed the Dalai Lama clique for instigating these activities.
Li accused the Dalai Lama of being the hatchet man of anti-China forces in the world, the ringleader of the conspiracy of "Free Tibet", the ultimate agitator of the chaos of Tibet and Tibetan Buddhism and the utmost impediment to the normal development of Tibetan Buddhism, reported Xinhua.
"Our combat with the Dalai Lama clique is not on the ethical or religious fronts but a serious political struggle.
"Unity and stability bring blessings while separation and turmoils result misfortune. Tibetan people are firm and resolute in their combat with the Dalai Lama clique and have successfully made one after another tough, preemptive and political contests with the separatist forces," Li said.
"The hearts of Tibetan people are always favouring Beijing and the Communist Party of China. The separatist activities of Dalai Lama clique are doomed to fail," the official added.
The Dalai Lama along with many of his supporters fled Tibet and took refuge in India when Chinese troops moved in and took control of Lhasa in 1959.
Some 140,000 Tibetans now live in exile, over 100,000 of them in different parts of India. Over six million Tibetans live in what is now known as the Tibet Autonomous Region of China.