ULAN BATOR, Mongolia — The Dalai Lama arrived in Mongolia late Monday, defying likely protests from China, which accuses the exiled Tibetan Buddhist leader of being a separatist rebel.

The Dalai Lama arrived at 9:30 p.m., local time, aboard a chartered Mongolian Airlines flight from Tokyo and was driven by police motorcade to a secluded compound about 70 kilometres outside the capital city of Ulan Bator, where he will stay during his visit.

The 71-year-old waved as he drove past reporters in a car adorned with striped Buddhist flags as saffron-robed monks clicked pictures with camera phones.

The Dalai Lama is expected to hold several public lectures and meetings with Buddhist clergy in this landlocked state wedged between Russia and China.

Organizers of the visit have kept the Dalai Lama's travel schedule under tight wraps in an attempt to avoid angering Beijing, which cut off rail links with Mongolia for two days in 2002 in apparent retaliation for his last visit.

There had been few outward signs of his impending arrival in Ulan Bator, Mongolia's low-rise capital, now in the throes of a tourism and construction boom.

The Mongolian government has not been openly involved in arranging the visit, and it wasn't clear whether the Dalai Lama would be received by President Nambaryn Enkhbayar or other top leaders.

China routinely calls on countries not to let the Dalai Lama visit, often hinting at possible diplomatic or commercial retaliation. Beijing has yet to issue a formal statement on this visit, but recent statements in Communist party media have criticized such trips as an effort to rally anti-China forces and realize Tibetan independence.

Beijing claims to have ruled Tibet for centuries, though the country was effectively independent when communist troops arrived in 1950.

The Dalai Lama fled to India following an abortive 1959 uprising against Chinese rule. A recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, he travels widely as a speaker on religion and morality and a representative of Tibetan culture.

The Dalai Lama is widely revered in Mongolia, whose people have strong historical links to Tibet and have traditionally followed Tibet's esoteric school of Buddhism.

Yet decades of communist rule that ended in the early 1990s nearly wiped out Buddhist institutions, and the religion's hold on the young is tenuous. Mongolia's open society has also allowed new competitors to Buddhism.

During the Dalai Lama's planned weeklong trip, Ulan Bator will also host visits by Indian meditation guru Sri Sri Ravi Shankar and a Christian evangelist group.