Beijing 2008: October 2007 Archives

By Stephen Collinson | AFP | via (uncensored) Yahoo! News
October 18, 2007

President George W. Bush Wednesday called for an end to "religious repression" in China as he defiantly became the first US leader to appear in public with the Dalai Lama.

The exiled Tibetan spiritual leader accepted the Congressional Gold Medal, lawmakers' highest civilian honor, in a formal ceremony in the US Capitol's ornate Rotunda -- a move certain to further enrage leaders in Beijing.

Bush praised the 72-year-old Buddhist icon for keeping the "flame" of Tibet's people alive, and called on Beijing to open political talks with him about the region's future.

"They will find this good man to be a man of peace and reconciliation," Bush said in the decorous room beneath the soaring dome of the US Capitol building, watched by lawmakers, Tibetan exiles and Buddhist monks.

"Americans cannot look to the plight of the religiously oppressed and close our eyes or turn away," Bush said.

"That is why I will continue to urge the leaders of China to welcome the Dalai Lama to China," said the president, in a ceremony broadcast live to China by radio, television and the Internet by Voice of America.

The Dalai Lama reiterated that he was not seeking independence from China but wanted greater autonomy, and he said he was sorry that his presence in the United States had ruffled Sino-US relations.

"The consistency of American support for Tibet has not gone unnoticed in China," he said during the ceremony.

"Where this has caused some tension in the US-China relations I feel a sense of regret."

Bush had earlier provoked a fresh outburst of anger from Beijing, for his previous private meeting on Tuesday with the Dalai Lama, a style of encounter preferred by previous US presidents.

The Dalai Lama fled to India following a failed uprising against Chinese rule in 1959, and currently lives in the northern hill town of Dharamsala, which is also the seat of his government in exile.

China has ruled Tibet since sending troops into the region in 1950, and officially "liberating" it from feudal rule a year later.

Senate Republican minority leader Mitch McConnell praised Bush for appearing at the public event with the Dalai Lama.

"US presidents have met privately with the Dalai Lama for years, but it wasn't until today that any of them had lent the prestige of the office to a public event," McConnell said.

Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi earlier warned that Bush's private meeting with the Dalai Lama and the Congress ceremony represented "a severe violation of the norms of international relations."

He accused the United States of having "severely hurt" China's feelings and interfered in its internal affairs.

>> Read the complete article

By Mark Magnier | Los Angeles Times
October 17, 2007

Beijing says Bush's meeting with the Tibetan will damage relations and calls on the U.S. to cancel plans to grant him a medal.

China lashed out Tuesday at President Bush's White House meeting with the Dalai Lama, arguing that it would seriously damage relations between Washington and Beijing, and called on the U.S. to cancel plans to honor the famous Tibetan figure with a Congressional Gold Medal.

"We solemnly demand that the U.S. cancel the extremely wrong arrangements," Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi told reporters hours before the meeting. "It seriously violates the norm of international relations and seriously wounded the feelings of the Chinese people and interfered with China's internal affairs."

The Dalai Lama, recipient of the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize, has been based in India since fleeing his homeland during a failed uprising against Chinese rule in 1959. China has condemned him as a "splittist" intent on undermining Chinese sovereignty by working for the independence of Tibet. The Dalai Lama says he is only seeking to expand autonomy, not establish a separate state.

The White House dismissed China's concerns, saying the president has had private meetings with many religious leaders, including the pope.

"The president believes that people all over the world should be able to express their religion and practice their religion in freedom. And that's why the president wants to meet with him," White House Press Secretary Dana Perino said. "He believes he should be honored as a great spiritual leader."

>> Read the complete report

By REUTERS | The New York Times
October 16, 2007

China expressed fury on Tuesday that the United States is to honor the Dalai Lama with an award and warned that the activities of his supporters were increasing in Chinese-controlled Tibet.

The Dalai Lama, who has lived in exile in India since staging a failed uprising against Chinese rule in 1959, is to receive the U.S. Congressional Gold Medal on Wednesday after being hosted at the White House by President George W. Bush.

"We are furious," Tibet's Communist Party boss, Zhang Qingli, told reporters. "If the Dalai Lama can receive such an award, there must be no justice or good people in the world."

China, which views the Dalai Lama as a separatist and a traitor, pulled out of a meeting this week at which world powers were to discuss Iran in protest at the U.S. plan to honor him.

China has also cancelled an annual human rights dialogue with Germany to show is displeasure over German Chancellor Angela Merkel's September meeting with the Dalai Lama.

Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi said China had expressed its "resolute opposition" to the award.

"China has solemnly demanded the United States cancel the above-mentioned and extremely wrongful arrangement," Yang told reporters on the sidelines of the 17th Communist Party Congress.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao said that if the decision to honor the Dalai Lama was not reversed it would have an "extremely serious impact" on bilateral relations.

China had pulled out of the meeting on Iran for "technical reasons," he told a news conference.

China's rhetoric against the Dalai Lama, whom Tibetan Buddhists consider their spiritual leader, has been increasing in line with his accolades abroad, even though the government and the Dalai's envoys are engaged in a tentative dialogue process.

>> Read complete news item

By Michael Weisskopf | TIME Magazine
October 13, 2007

Next summer's Olympics will showcase a China of glittering skyscrapers and overstuffed store shelves. But the government responsible for this economic miracle continues to imprison political activists, restrict religious freedom, tightly control the media and Internet, and protect its citizens only haphazardly from pollution and unsafe food and consumer products, a congressional panel reported Friday.

The Congressional-Executive Commission on China credited Communist Party leaders with increasing legal protections for those who abstain from unauthorized political and religious activities, but noted the safeguards are selectively enforced. "Against persons the Party deems to pose a threat to its supremacy, officials wield the legal system as a harsh and deliberately unpredictable weapon," the panel concluded in its annual report on the state of human rights and rule of law in China.

With the Games seen as a mark of its arrival, Beijing is under pressure from foreign activists to comply with international standards from the workplace to air quality. Friday?s report added leverage for human rights reforms because of the official U.S. imprimatur: the CECC consists of nine senators, nine House members and five senior Administration officials appointed by the President.

The commission veered from its central focus to such recent issues as food and product safety, which also affects foreign consumers of Chinese exports. The report praised Beijing for reforms, but complained of "inadequate and inconsistent implementation, corruption and a lack of regulatory incentives." Worse, the government discouraged consumer organizations and harassed people for reporting problems with consumer products. Likewise, environmental reforms have been hampered by uncooperative local authorities and official suppression of green activists and the free flow of information, the report said.

Human rights came in for the toughest criticism. Despite a 2005 pledge to "provide relief" for its political prisoners, Beijing continued to detain and imprison democracy activists as well as those attempting to organize workers in labor unions not approved by the government. Police routinely detain people for days without formal charge or more justification than to avoid protests or "social unrest," it said.

A database set up by the commission to monitor political and religious prisoners numbered 4,060 cases as of September.

The past year saw a tightening of the screws on religion, the report said, with Beijing continuing its "campaign of persecution" against the Falun Gong spiritual movement. Protestant church gatherings that didn't register with the government were shut down, and Catholics blocked from contact with the Vatican. Independent clergy were detained and coerced.

Tibetan Buddhists faced greater repression in recent months, said the report, as authorities continued to detain and imprison Tibetans for peaceful expression and nonviolent action -- at least 100 such cases were identified.

>> Read the complete article

By David Lague | The New York Times
October 10, 2007

China has promoted at least four senior military officers with experience in planning for war over Taiwan ahead of a major political meeting next week at which the Communist Party has said it will adopt a new strategy to stop the self-governing island moving toward independence.

In a move that was quietly handled even by the standards of China's secretive military, Beijing last month elevated Gen. Chen Bingde of the army to chief of the general staff, a post where he will exercise day-to-day operational command of the country's 2.3 million-strong armed forces.

As General Chen was promoted through the senior ranks in the 1980s and 1990s, he held a series of command posts in the Nanjing Military Region opposite Taiwan, where China has concentrated its preparations for any conflict over the island, according to official biographies and military analysts.

General Chen's previous post was director general of the general armaments department, where he led the rapid modernization of Chinese military hardware and the country's high-profile space program.

Gen. Xu Qiliang, a veteran air force pilot who served in a number of operational and staff posts in the Nanjing military region, was appointed head of the air force last month, state news media reported.

And state news media reported last month that another senior air force officer with command experience in the Nanjing region, Gen. Ma Xiaotian, had been promoted to deputy chief of the general staff.

In the earlier stages of a wider reshuffle of top posts through China's seven military regions, Adm. Wu Shengli was appointed last year to head the navy.

Admiral Wu has also held critical appointments that give him a solid grounding in naval operations in the Taiwan Strait.

Experts say these appointments are not designed specifically to threaten Taiwan but are part of China's overall military development where a top priority is enforcing the mainland's claim of sovereignty over the island if necessary.

"It sends a message more broadly that Beijing is enhancing its military capability to deal with Taiwan in any future conflict," said Andrew Yang, secretary general of the Chinese Council of Advanced Policy Studies, a Taipei-based security policy institute. "There is more emphasis on the quality of the commanders."

>> Read the complete article 

By REUTERS | The New York Times
October 09, 2007

China, in its latest tirade against Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, on Tuesday accused the exiled Nobel peace prize laureate of supporting "evil cults" like Falun Gong and Japan's Aum Shinrikyo.

China has ruled the mountainous Himalayan region of Tibet with an iron fist since Chinese troops marched in there in 1950.

The Dalai Lama fled into exile in India after a failed uprising against communist rule in 1959 and is branded by China as a "separatist." He says he only wants greater autonomy for the region.

In a lengthy signed commentary in English carried by the official Xinhua news agency, the piece said the Dalai Lama "not only has no hatred toward evil cults but instead shows a great deal of compassion for them."

The Dalai Lama supported Shoko Asahara and his Aum Shinrikyo cult, who carried out a sarin nerve gas attack on the Tokyo subway in 1995 which killed 12 and made thousands sick, Xinhua said, in a piece signed by somebody calling themselves Shi Shan.

"It was the support and connivance of the 14th Dalai Lama who took the foe for his friend that made Asahara feel secure in the knowledge that he had strong backing," Xinhua said, in typically strong language.

"It is the 14th Dalai Lama's own deeds that have step by step betrayed his real intentions and political ambitions put under the guise of Buddhism and peace," it added.

The Dalai Lama also provided succor to the Falun Gong, a spiritual movement banned by China as an "evil cult," and its leader Li Hongzhi, Xinhua said.

"... Even such an evil cult leader who is denounced by many people and had to flee abroad to escape the punishment of laws secured compassion and admiration from the 14th Dalai Lama," it added.

Critics have accused China of repressing religious freedom in Tibet and other parts of the country, but Beijing counters by saying it guarantees religious freedom and invests large amounts of money every year to modernize the underdeveloped Tibetan region.

Last month, China chided German Chancellor Angela Merkel for hosting the Dalai Lama and demanded Berlin take action to repair damage to bilateral ties.

By Jill Savitt | salon.com
October 04, 2007

Slick P.R. moves around the '08 Olympics can't hide the fact that China is still complicit in the Darfur genocide.

The Chinese government can be very persuasive when it wants to be. China persuaded the International Olympic Committee to award Beijing the 2008 Olympic Games -- marking the first time in more than 20 years that the Games will be held under an authoritarian government.

Now, China is attempting to persuade world leaders, the media and the public that Beijing has suddenly become a leader for peace in regard to Darfur. But there are many signs that China's recent efforts have been little more than a public relations campaign to spare the Olympic host from continued negative publicity about its complicity in the Darfur genocide.

For four long years, China was a major, if not the chief obstacle to international efforts to bring security to Darfur. Beijing blocked, vetoed or diluted resolutions at the U.N. Security Council that would have authorized a protection operation or sanctions on Khartoum for continued intransigence.

Suddenly this spring -- as China's role in Darfur was discussed publicly in light of the upcoming Olympics -- China took some new, high-profile steps to address Darfur. Beijing appointed a special envoy for the region. It announced that it would send 300 engineers to Darfur, and in a major turnaround China voted on July 31 for a U.N. resolution authorizing an African Union-United Nations "hybrid" force of up to 26,000 troops and police for Darfur.

Beijing insists -- in media interviews and in face-to-face meetings with Darfur advocates, including myself -- that its new and improved positions on Darfur have not come in response to pressure from activists pointing up the hypocrisy of simultaneously sponsoring a genocide in Africa and an Olympics at home. Beijing has said its position on Darfur is based on principle.

But if China's Darfur policy is indeed based on principle rather than public relations, there is far more it could do to help bring security to Darfur. It could begin by speaking honestly about the realities on the ground there. After a visit to Darfur in May, China's special envoy Liu Guijin said, "I didn't see a desperate scenario of people dying of hunger." Rather, Mr. Liu said the people of Darfur thanked him "for the Chinese government's help in building dams and providing water supply equipment."

Since then, in fact, the security situation in Darfur has gone from bad to worse. Humanitarian organizations are pulling out their personnel, and African Union forces were recently attacked and killed by a splinter group of rebels.

China could put a moratorium on oil ventures with Khartoum. Beijing contends that its purchase of oil from the regime in Khartoum -- more than $1 billion each year -- and its massive investment in infrastructure should be viewed as entirely separate from the violence and murder in Darfur. But it is oil revenues from China that continue to fuel the Sudanese regime's buying of planes and bombs, and its backing of hired killers, the Janjaweed.

China could suspend arms sales to the Sudanese regime, and demand that all other nations follow suit. Human rights reports document that weapons sold by China to Khartoum have been used against the innocent people of Darfur. This fact is all the more troubling given that by selling arms to the regime, China is recouping some of the money it spends in Khartoum buying oil.

China could publicly urge the regime to disarm the Janjaweed and cease aerial bombing campaigns. It could also criticize the Sudanese regime's harassment of the world's largest humanitarian operation -- and cry foul when humanitarian workers are ousted, as happened recently to the director of CARE in Sudan.

While China has widely touted its U.N. vote for the "hybrid" force, it has of course been silent about the central role Beijing's diplomats played in weakening the resolution -- by stripping provisions that would have applied sanctions and provided a mandate to disarm threatening combatants.

China was persuasive enough to convince the international committee that it is worthy of being an Olympic host. Now it must act like one, and live up to the grand slogan it has chosen for the '08 games -- "One World, One Dream" -- especially when the stakes are so much greater than athletes winning medals.

By AlertNet | Reuters Foundation
October 05, 2007 

Beijing police have detained two relatives of a jailed housing rights activist, and prison officials are also mistreating an ethnic Mongolian political prisoner, according to human rights groups.

Ye Mingjun and Ye Guoqiang, son and brother of Ye Guozhu, sentenced for organising protests against forced evictions for the 2008 Beijing Olympics, are being held incommunicado, Amnesty International said in a statement.

Police came for Mingjun at his house on Sept. 29, and later told his family he was being held for "inciting subversion of state power", Amnesty said.

The police had detained Guoqiang earlier in the day for protesting forced evictions, also for the Olympics, in a southern part of Beijing, the group added.

"They are held incommunicado, putting them at high risk of torture or other ill-treatment," said Amnesty, which has previously warned Guozhu has been beaten and tortured with electric shocks in jail.

The government has been cracking down on dissent ahead of a key Communist Party meeting that opens on Oct. 15.

>> Read the complete report 

By David Barboza | The New York Times
October 03, 2007

A prominent human rights lawyer in Beijing says he was abducted, beaten and threatened over the weekend by a gang of men who demanded that he and his family leave the city.

The lawyer, Li Heping, has gained renown here for his defense of environmental activists, imprisoned lawyers and church leaders, and has also considered representing a member of Falun Gong, the banned religious sect.

Human rights groups say Chinese lawyers, activists and dissidents are often subjected to harassment, beatings or threats of long jail terms for pressing claims that seem to challenge the government and the nation's legal system.

In a telephone interview on Tuesday, Mr. Li said his abductors did not say why they were beating him.

"I don't know why they did it," Mr. Li said. "They just told me to leave Beijing. They didn't tell me why they did it."

The abduction of Mr. Li, 37, was first reported by Radio Free Asia, a nonprofit group in Washington that broadcasts news to Asian countries in local languages, and that often reports on human rights cases and minority causes in China.

Mr. Li's ordeal began Saturday, on the eve of a national holiday week observing the 58th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China and as Shanghai was preparing to play host to the 2007 Special Olympics.

Radio Free Asia officials say they received a tip about the kidnapping that day and then contacted Mr. Li.

In the telephone interview on Tuesday night, Mr. Li said he was followed after leaving his office late Saturday by a group of men who eventually grabbed him, put a bag over his head and drove him to a location where they beat him in a basement, sometimes tormenting him with a high-powered electric rod.

Later, he said, the abductors drove him to another location in the suburbs of Beijing, where they left him and told him that he and his family ought to leave Beijing immediately.

Mr. Li said he later visited a hospital because he was suffering from hearing loss and swelling in his face.

Doctors told him he may have suffered serious head injuries, he said. Mr. Li also said he reported the incident to the police.

After being released by his abductors, Mr. Li said he returned home to discover that some of his personal belongings were missing, including legal files and his license to practice law.

In a statement released to a human rights group, Mr. Li said: "As a lawyer, I had the chance to experience electric punishment and torture. I was rolling on the ground and they continued laughing and beating me. This torture lasted about four or five hours."

Human Rights in China, an organization based in New York, issued a statement by its executive director, Sharon Hom, saying, "As the international community increases its scrutiny of China in the lead-up to the Olympics, it is appalling that this kind of attack on lawyers continue."

The statement went on, "These attacks raise serious concerns about the will and ability of the Chinese government to protect lawyers' personal safety and right to practice law, which are essential elements of a system of rule of law."