BEIJING, Jan 14 (AFP) - China warned Taiwan Tuesday to be on guard against "separatist" activities of the Dalai Lama, who has been invited to visit the island in March by a Buddhist group.

"The Dalai Lama is not only a religious leader he was the biggest slave-driver before the peaceful liberation of Tibet and he became a separatist shortly afterwards," said Shen Guofang, a spokesman for the Chinese foreign ministry. "We hope the Taiwan authorities will take note of these two points," he said at a regular news conference.

Tibet's spiritual leader, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, will not have any meetings with Taiwanese officials during his 10-day visit in mid-March, according to an official of the Buddhist organization that invited him.

It will be his first visit to Taiwan, where Chinese nationalists fled after their defeat by the communists in a civil war in 1949.

China seized control of Tibet in 1951. The Dalai Lama has lived in exile in India since the failure of a Tibetan revolt against Chinese rule in 1959.