Xinhua is upset: the Dalai Lama is planning to arrive in France from June 6-8 to become an honorary citizen of Paris. While the national government of France has pledged that no federal officials will meet with him, the mayor of Paris is offering the Dalai Lama honorary citizenship (and thus the trip).
Here he is in Paris in 2003, giving an interview (the present link is also in French translation, with better links than the YouTube version):
Chinese media notes that the visit could again destabilize Sino-French relations, and asserts that the timing of the visit is intended to maximize global visibility (it is planned for the day after Obama’s trip to Normandy to commemorate the D-Day invasion of 1944).
Xinhua has also put together a nicely gigantic surveillance page of Sarkozy and the French government.
France24 has some solid analysis and video on this.
Fortunately, China is already gearing up for what is sure to be an outsized campaign called “I Love You, China” to commemorate the 65th anniversary of the People’s Republic this coming October 1.
Adam Cathcart 