Chinese Vice-President Xi Jinping vowed on Tuesday to crack down on separatist forces he said were led by the Dalai Lama, suggesting that China's heir apparent to the presidency will not ease Beijing's hardline stance towards the region, Reuters reported. Xi made the remarks in his first major speech on the subject, just days after the exiled Dalai Lama leader met U.S. President Barack Obama in Washington, angering China. "The extraordinary development of Tibet over the past 60 years points to an irrefutable truth: without the Chinese Communist Party, there would have been no new China, no new Tibet," Xi said, at an event to mark 60 years since Tibet's "peaceful liberation". -- SPA
