[Minghui Net] World Daily editorial, February 8, 2001

In regard to the U.S. Air Force using China as an assumed model enemy for a military space combat rehearsal, Beijing's Foreign Affairs Office "deeply expressed its worries" and at the same time stated that it will boycott the U.S. in developing a nationwide missile defense system and it will make large efforts to gain allies to push for anti space-arms-race treaties. In reality, behind the noisy "Star Wars" defense/offense system and the debate of whether the U.S. will increase selling weapons to Taiwan, the real test facing the relationship between China and the U.S. is the challenge of the human rights issue. This is not just because Bush's government emphasizes the values of human rights; the bottom line is, if Beijing shortens the gap on human rights issues with the U.S., the U.S. will reduce its increasing suspicion of China, and the arms race crisis will ease accordingly. In actuality, the White House and the State Department have already started to discuss how to use effective means to push the Chinese Central Government's high-level officials to improve human rights. In the short run, the U.S. State Department will publish its annual human rights report at the end of this month. It will strongly criticize the current worsening condition of human rights in China, especially the suppression of religions. Naturally, this will affect Secretary of Sate Powell's decision on whether to continue criticizing Beijing in next month's United Nations human rights conference.

In reality Beijing clearly understands, whether it is on setting up the missile defense system, or on the relationship between Taiwan and China, or even the China - U.S. trade deficit problem, the direction that U.S. public opinion will take depends on the evaluation of China's human rights situation by the U.S. government. This is also why during the meeting with Li Zhaoxing, who is about to leave his post as ambassador, Powell issued a warning that he would be "straightforward" about bringing up human rights matters: Beijing must follow law and justice to govern and must accept the free enterprise system and the great force of democracy. Since Beijing is facing challenges from both inside and outside such as an internal power transfer, dealing with the impact of entering the World Trade Organization, applying for hosting the 2008 Olympic games, plus the rising of Western conservative idealism following Bush's becoming President, China cannot avoid directly compromising with the U.S. on human rights issues to reduce the "hostility" of the American public and to improve China's peaceful image. In the latter part of last month, Beijing intentionally revealed to United Nations Secretary-General Annan that during the two forth-coming central government meetings, China will pass a very important human rights related international treaty, the "Economy, Society and Culture Rights International Treaty," and it will also pass the "Citizen Political Rights International Treaty" signed in 1998. Through the passing of these two treaties, it looks like China's human rights have been legally protected on the surface but whether Beijing is really going to use it in real life makes one suspicious.

Based on the current situation, there are many difficulties facing Beijing in making progress on human rights that will lead to initial recognition from the international community. First of all, after the Falun Gong practitioners' self-immolation incident (Note: this is just reported by the xxx party. Falun Gong practitioners have already asked for an independent investigation on this matter), the outside world increased their concerns; Falun Gong also raised the degree of resistance both in China and overseas. Holland's foreign minister canceling a visit to China is an early indication that the Falun Gong incident has affected diplomatic areas. It is almost a "Mission Impossible" for Beijing to neutralize Falun Gong's challenge to the government and at the same time convince the outside world that the government did not suppress human rights in the Falun Gong incident. Second of all, even though Beijing defines Falun Gong as a "XX (slanderous words respectfully omitted),"in order to maintain a totalitarian government, it still needs to raise the torn flag of communism disallowing traditional religion to have freedom of speech and beliefs. The proof can be seen in the Chinese government's suppression of religious organizations. Incidentally, Bush's victory in the election was mainly supported by U.S. Christian conservative forces who are deeply concerned over Beijing's suppression of religious organizations and their members. They will monitor and pressure Bush's government to closely pursue the Beijing human rights issues. Thirdly, during the widespread growth of the Internet in this information age, the Chinese government is still forcing "One-Voice House," setting up policies to fool its citizens, disallowing freedom of speech. Even then, Beijing is still continuously creating "jail for false literature" and "thinking criminal." All these undoubtedly are the biggest suppressions of human rights and it is also the biggest obstacle for China's democracy.

U.S. mainstream media have been criticizing Clinton's government for placing human rights issues on a low priority when it comes to the U.S. -- China relationship; at the same time they urge Bush's new government not to concentrate on trade and safety issues at the sacrifice of the issues of freedom of religion and freedom of politics in China. Without a doubt, human rights issues will become one of the main influences in the U.S. -- China relationship. Therefore, Beijing should not use human rights issues as political gambling chips. It should view human rights as an important goal towards modernizing the country, put it quickly on the political reform agenda, and truly guarantee the enforcement of human rights treaties. Only then can Beijing truly and legitimately deal with the U.S. and other countries in foreign affairs; only then can it win the sympathy of U.S. public opinion and that of the international community; only then can it avoid scrambling to create a series of human rights masks in order to apply for hosting the Olympic games and to avoid criticism from the United Nations Human Rights committee.

Posting date: 2/14/2001
Original article date: 2/8/2001
Category: News & Media Reports
Translated on 2/10/2001
Chinese version available at http://minghui.cc/mh/articles/2001/2/9/7886.html

 Yearly Archive  Printer Version