NEW DELHI (AP) — The Dalai Lama praised Chinese President Xi Jinping on Saturday for being “more realistic” and principled than his predecessors, a day after Xi’s three-day visit to India ended.

The Tibetan Buddhist spiritual leader has lived in exile for decades in India’s Himalayan foothill city of Dharamsala, after fleeing China following a failed 1959 uprising. The arrangement has irritated Beijing, which has long accused the Dalai Lama of fomenting unrest and encouraging Buddhist monks to self-immolate in demanding more autonomy for Tibet, a Himalayan region in western China that borders India, Bhutan and Nepal.

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