Visit by Dalai Lama's Backers Acknowledged

CHINA

China confirmed that supporters of the Dalai Lama were visiting and said it hoped that they would take a positive message back to the Tibetan spiritual leader.

Officials in Washington said the Dalai Lama's special envoy had arrived in China for talks on the exiled leader's aspirations for Tibetan autonomy, the third such visit in three years.

A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman played down the visit, declining even to describe the visitors as envoys.