BEIJING: China on Friday urged US President Barack Obama to cancel a planned meeting with exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama.

“China is firmly opposed to this,” foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said in a statement on its website. “We urge the US side to treat China's concern in a serious way and immediately cancel the planned meeting.”

China calls the Dalai Lama a “wolf in sheep's clothing” and accuses him of seeking independence for Tibet.

Hua said that China had “already lodged solemn representations” with the United States over the planned White House meeting, which was announced earlier by the US.

“The US leader's meeting with the Dalai is a gross interference in China's internal affairs, a severe violation of codes of international relations and will seriously impair China-US relations,” Hua said.

Obama last met the Dalai Lama, a fellow Nobel peace laureate, at the White House in 2011 in talks that triggered an angry response from Beijing, which said the encounter had harmed Sino-US relations.