By Jane Macartney

BEIJING, Jan 12 (Reuter) - China's Communist Party chief Jiang Zemin met the official reincarnation of the Panchen Lama on Friday and urged the six-year-old boy, Tibetan Buddhism's second-ranking monk, to defend patriotism in the unruly Himalayan region.

"The Communist Party and government hope the 11th Panchen Lama will study well, grow up healthy and inherit the patriotic spirit of previous Panchen Lamas," the party chief, who is also state president, told the boy in a meeting in Beijing's Zhongnanhai compound, the heart of party rule.

The boy - identified in an ancient ceremony in the Tibetan capital Lhasa presided over by a senior party official last month - presented Jiang with the white silk scarf that in Tibet conveys the blessing of the Living Buddha.

Jiang, dressed in a sober grey suit, smiled, clapped and offered a similar gauzy scarf in return, giving the official blessing of Beijing's atheist rulers to the tiny reincarnation.

The enthronement of Gyaincain Norbu as the "soul boy" recipient of the spirit of the 10th Panchen Lama, who died in 1989, aroused a storm of controversy because it superseded the announcement of a different reincarnation by Tibet's exiled god-king, the Dalai Lama.

China's action has posed Tibet's deeply religious inhabitants with a stark choice -- the boy with the blessing of China's ruling party or Gedhun Choekyi Nyima, the six-year-old named last May by the Dalai Lama.

Gyaincain Norbu, wrapped in a padded yellow silk robe and his feet encased in traditional gold-embroidered sheepskin boots, looked bewildered as he perched in a stuffed armchair and faced the 69-year-old party chief across a bowl of flowers.

"Thank you to the party and to President Jiang," the boy said softly in Tibetan, his words translated by a monk seated behind him at the formal session held in the style for visiting foreign leaders. "I will study hard and be a patriotic Living Buddha who loves religion," he said.

Jiang spelt out Beijing's political message to Tibet, urging the boy "to uphold the leadership of the party" and "defend the unity of the motherland."

He also called on the child who will be responsible for the spiritual well-being of Tibet's Buddhists "to love socialism," but offered no advice on how to reconcile his dual tasks.

Since Beijing engineered its Panchen Lama choice on November 29, it has portrayed spiritual succession as part of an epic 30-year struggle with the Dalai Lama, condemned by China as a pro-independent "splittist."

The Dalai Lama and thousands of followers fled to India in 1959 after an abortive anti-Chinese uprising, but he continues to command the loyalty of many Buddshists in Tibet.

The region has been rocked by a series of often violent pro-independence protests since 1987 and China has jailed many monks and nuns who have spearheaded the movement to separate Tibet from China.

China says it has the final say over senior lamas under a 1792 agreement between Tibet and the imperial Qing dynasty. Tibetan exiles dispute this, saying the pact was informal and set not with China but with occupying Manchus who were toppled in 1911.

China asserted sovereignty over Tibet after its 1949 communist takeover, sending troops to purge Tibetan "feudalism" and install socialism.