KATHMANDU, Jan 4 (AFP) -- Nepal's communist opposition leader on Thursday accused the government of endangering the country's ties with China by "actively participating" in the Tibetan independence movement.

"The anti-Chinese movement is gradually gaining ground in Nepal," said Nepal Communist Party-United Marxist and Leninist (NCP-UML) secretary general Madhav Kumar Nepal, adding militant Tibetans were active within the country.

"The present tri-partite government has not taken any steps to stop such activities on Nepalese soil against its neighbour," Nepal told a meeting organised by the Editor's Guild in Kathmandu.

Owing to its geographic position, locked between giants China and India, Nepal has traditionally pursued strict non-aligned policies.

"But the ministers in the present coalition government are actively participating in the Free Tibet Movement programmes," Nepal said.

"We are geographically placed in a very sensitive position. Therefore we should not allow our territory to be misused against our friendly countries," he added.

There are about 25,000 Tibetan refugees in Nepal, most of whom run carpet-weaving businesses and operate economy hotels and restaurants.

Most of them fled following a failed 1959 uprising against Chinese rule in Tibet, although the majority of refugees went to India with their spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, who now runs a government-in-exile.

The communist leader said the government had been tolerating activists who had been conspiring against Nepal's "friendly neighbours."

The tri-partite coalition government was formed on September 12 after three parties jointly overthrew a ten-month old NCP-UML government after a vote of no-confidence.

The coalition partners are the Nepali Congress (NC) led by Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba, the rightist Rastriya Prajatantra Party (RPP) and the pro-India Nepal Sadbhavana Party (NSP).