Beijing - International rights groups on Wednesday urged US President Barack Obama to press Chinese leaders to improve the country's human rights record during his visit to China next week.

The Chinese Human Rights Defenders sent an open letter to Obama asking him to "demonstrate a clear and strong US commitment to promoting human rights in China."

"We ask you to urge the leaders of the Chinese government to take concrete actions to promote these fundamental human values during your visit to Beijing," the letter said.

New York-based Human Rights Watch urged Obama to "make the protection and promotion of human rights in China a central purpose" of his first visit to the country.

"In the nine months since you took office, the trend on human rights in China has been distinctly negative," Human Rights Watch said in its open letter.

"The Chinese government has continued to demonstrate its profound hostility towards human rights and has failed to keep its commitments to undertake reforms towards a more open society based on the rule of law," it said.

Human Rights Watch listed problems that included the government disbarring human rights lawyers, stalling on key legal reforms, imprisoning dissidents, and tightening controls over state media and the internet.

US actor Richard Gere also signed a letter to Obama as the chairman of the board of the International Campaign for Tibet.

"As you are aware, the Tibetan movement, its sincere supporters and the human rights community have been alarmed and disappointed by your decision not to meet his holiness the Dalai Lama during his October visit to Washington, DC," Gere said.

Gere said the Dalai Lama, the exiled spiritual leader of China's 6 million Tibetans, was "gracious and understanding" toward Obama's decision not to meet him.

But he said the US president's failure to meet the Dalai Lama, who China labels a separatist, could be seen as a "minor compromise" that would potentially lead to a "tremendous setback" for both the Tibetans' cause and human rights.

US officials said Obama planned to cover a "very broad agenda" in talks with Chinese President Hu Jintao, including several human rights issues.

On Monday, Jeffrey Bader of the US National Security Council told a White House briefing that Obama was likely to raise issues such as "freedom of expression, access to information, freedom of religion, rule of law and, certainly, Tibet."

Obama was scheduled to arrive in Shanghai on Monday and hold talks with Hu in Beijing on Tuesday and Wednesday. (dpa)