After a crackdown on protests against Chinese rule in Tibet, an international diplomatic chorus earlier this year urged dialogue with the Dalai Lama. Beijing abruptly announced in late April that it intended to meet his aides.

"During this brief visit, the envoys will take up the urgent issue of the current crisis in the Tibetan areas," the government-in-exile said in a statement on its website.

Tibet has become a flashpoint for anti-China protests that have disrupted the Olympic torch relay around the world and has led to calls for state leaders to boycott the Beijing Games, which open on Aug. 8.

The envoys are due to arrive in China on Saturday for what the Tibetan side called "informal talks".

"We are hopeful that the Chinese are willing to address the Tibet issue realistically," Tenzin Taklha, a spokesman of the Dalai Lama, told Reuters from India, where the self-proclaimed Tibetan government-in-exile is based.

Despite the offer of talks, China has accused Tibet's exiled spiritual leader, who fled Tibet after a failed 1959 uprising against Communist rule, of manipulating opinion and governments in the West.

China has blamed the exiled Buddhist leader's "clique" for unrest across Lhasa and other Tibetan areas, which it says was aimed at upstaging the Olympic Games.

There have been six rounds of dialogue between China and the Dalai Lama's envoys since 2002 with no breakthrough.

It remains to be seen if the Olympics present a genuine opportunity for progress, or if China is merely trying to deflect criticism ahead of the games by appearing open to dialogue.

"Both sides know there is nowhere to go apart from talks," said Prof. Mira Sinha Bhattacharjea, emeritus fellow of the Institute of Chinese Studies in New Delhi.