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European Union Nations Raised the Issue of the Persecution of Falun Gong Many Times in the EU-China Human Rights Dialogue (Clearwisdom.net) In early March, the Irish Ministry of Foreign
Affairs held a conference to inform Irish non-governmental organizations of the
result of its human rights dialogue with China. "The EU-China Human Right
Dialogue" in the first half of 2004 was held for two days at the end of
February in Dublin, Ireland, the capital of the incumbent EU President's home
country. The conference was presided over by Mr. John Bigger, head of the Human
Rights Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Amnesty International
Ireland, The Frontline Human Right Defense, the Tibetan Human Rights
Organization and the Irish Falun Gong Association were invited to the
conference. John Bigger reported on China's human rights issues raised in the dialogue
and the responses by the Chinese side. The Irish government brought up a series
of China's human rights issues in the dialogue, including the persecution of
Falun Gong, Tibetan issues, capital punishment, etc. Mr. Bigger said that when
mentioning various human right issues such as freedom of speech and freedom of
belief, the Irish government repeatedly touched on the matter concerning the
persecution of Falun Gong. The individual cases pertaining to the victims of the
persecution raised include Liu Feng and Yang Fang, the Chinese students who used
to study in Ireland. Liu Feng and Yang Fang returned to China on vacation at the
end of 1999, but were arrested and their passports were confiscated because they
practice Falun Gong. They have not been allowed to return to Ireland to continue
their studies so far. As to China's responses to the issues regarding Falun
Gong, Mr. Bigger didn't elaborate on it. Mr. Bigger's comment on the result of
this dialogue was: "achieve limited results in limited areas." One thing strange to those from non-governmental organizations was that
"The EU-China Human Right Dialogue" turned out to be proposed by the
Chinese side. According to international custom, a dialogue is supposed to
address both sides' issues, but this dialogue only discussed China's human right
situation. When looking at it from the Chinese perspective, it was an unfair
dialogue. To the condemnation of China's human rights situation by international
society including the U.S., the Chinese Government has always maintained a
denying position. However, on the contrary, it proposed to proceed with an
unfair dialogue this time. It will inevitably make people feel very strange. In
his comment, the representative of the Irish Falun Gong Association, Zhao Ming,
who attended the dialogue said: "This cooperative human rights dialogue
will make sense only after China has the sincerity to improve its human rights.
Nonetheless, the cruel persecution participated and inflicted by all levels of
the entire Chinese government system on Falun Gong has lasted more than four
years. The facts showed that the Chinese government doesn't have any sincerity
to improve its human rights." Another fact is that since the EU started to
have human rights dialogues with China, the governments of the EU countries have
basically ceased to openly condemn China's human rights situation. At present,
more and more human rights organizations have perceived the limitation of this
kind of human rights dialogue, and urged the EU to improve its human rights
dialogue with China. Prior to this dialogue, FIDH and HRIC wrote an open letter to the EU, along
with a twenty-six-page evaluation report on "The EU-China Human Rights
Dialogue." In the letter, these two human rights organizations stated:
"The human rights dialogue can and must be more effective and more
transparent, and it should be related to China's human rights situation. We
believe that these indicators are an effective means for evaluation. The
application of these indicators is of help to create a more 'result-oriented'
dialogue, and generate 'noticeable improvements.'" Background Information "The EU-China Human Rights Dialogue" began in January 1996, when
the home country of the EU President on behalf of the EU, aiming to help China
improve its human rights situation, held it. In 1997, the human rights dialogue
was suspended because ten EU countries came up with a resolution to condemn
China's human rights situation, but it resumed at the end of that year. Since
then on, it has been held every six months in China or the EU alternatively.
This human rights dialogue has two aspects. One is between governments and the
other between human rights scholars. Foreign Ministers or Vice Foreign Ministers
do not attend this dialogue, so usually its content is not open to the media. Source: http://clearharmony.net/articles/200403/18479.html
Posting date: 3/19/2004 |