China hails U.S. reiteration of sovereignty over Taiwan

"China approves of President Obama's repeated reiteration of the one-China principle," Hu told reporters.

Hu referred to China's "sovereignty over Taiwan and other matters" during a state visit in which some Western analysts had predicted that China would also demand an explicit declaration by Washington of China's sovereignty over the restive frontier regions of Tibet and Xinjiang.

Washington switched diplomatic recognition from Taipei, capital of self-ruled Taiwan, to Beijing in 1979 but remains the island's main arms supplier.

Obama did not meet Tibet's exiled spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, when he was in Washington in early October. But the Dalai Lama has said they may meet after Obama returns from China, which condemns the Buddhist monk as a separatist for demanding Tibetan self-determination.

The Dalai Lama fled into exile in India after an abortive uprising in 1959, nine years after Chinese troops marched into the Himalayan region.

(Reporting by Chris Buckley; Writing by Lucy Hornby; Editing by Ken Wills)