Pelosi Sees No Improvement In China on Human Rights

Agence France-Presse | The Washington Post
June 06, 2009

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said yesterday she sees no progress in China on human rights, regretting that neither economic reforms nor U.S. pressure are making Beijing budge.

Pelosi, who visited China last week, said Beijing is still holding prisoners for taking part in the Tiananmen Square democracy protests 20 years ago.

"Just our advocacy didn't accomplish any freedom in China. So somehow or other we have to find a way to do that," Pelosi said at the Brookings Institution.

Pelosi said she praised China's leadership in her meetings for lifting millions out of poverty, calling it a "remarkable" achievement.

"The problem I have is that -- people say, 'Well, look at Taiwan, look at [South] Korea, different places' -- economic reform leads to political reform," she said. "What I see in China is that economic reform is being used to suppress the political reform."

Pelosi rejected perceptions that she had softened her stance on human rights during the recent trip.

She said that her position as speaker allows her to raise human rights concerns at the highest level and that she directly petitioned President Hu Jintao to free jailed rights activists.

Pelosi said she has no regrets about angering Beijing's leaders in 1991 by unfurling a banner in Tiananmen Square in tribute "to those who died for democracy in China."

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