French President Nicolas Sarkozy held his long-awaited meeting with the Dalai Lama on Saturday, despite warnings from China that it could have a negative impact on links between the two countries.
The French president and the Tibetan spiritual leader sat down for a 30-minute talk behind closed doors in Gdansk (Poland) during celebrations marking the 25th anniversary of former Polish President Lech Walesa's Nobel Peace Prize.
Sarkozy told reporters before leaving for the airport that the meeting went "very well."
"I told him how much importance I attach to the pursuit of dialogue between the Dalai Lama and the Chinese leadership," Sarkozy said. "The Dalai Lama confirmed what I already knew, that he is not demanding independence."
The Dalai Lama did not talk to reporters before or after the meeting.
Sarkozy also said the Tibetan leader voiced concerns about his homeland, while the French leader said those worries "are shared in Europe."

Asked about the situation in Tibet, Sarkozy said: "The Dalai Lama shared with me his worries, worries which are shared in Europe. We have had a wide discussion of this question."

Sarkozy Defies China With Dalai Lama Talks

Beijing's unusually vocal criticism of Sarkozy's plan to meet the Dalai Lama is linked to the fact that Paris holds the European Union's rotating presidency, diplomats say.
In Paris, an official said there had been no sign yet of any Chinese boycott of French products. The EU is China's biggest trade partner and supermarket chain Carrefour employs tens of thousands of people in China and is the biggest purchaser of Chinese goods in France.
French companies were subjected to Chinese boycotts and demonstrations earlier this year after the Paris leg of the Olympic torch relay was disrupted by anti-China protesters.
Earlier on Saturday, the Dalai Lama called for dialogue and compassion to solve the world's problems.
"Warfare failed to solve our problems in the last century, so this century should be a century of dialogue," he told delegates, including Walesa, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk.
The Dalai Lama, who met Tusk privately on Saturday, praised Polish courage in resisting past oppression.
The 73-year-old monk is a popular figure in Poland, where some see in his struggle with China's communist authorities echoes of their own battles under Walesa against Soviet-backed communist rule that ended in 1989.
The Dalai Lama fled into exile in 1959 after a failed insurrection against Chinese rule in Tibet, occupied by People's Liberation Army troops from 1950.

(Additional reporting by Francois Murphy in Paris)

(Writing by Gareth Jones, editing by Elizabeth Piper)

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