Rt Hon Gordon Brown MP
Prime Minister
10 Downing Street
London
SW1A 2AA
Dear Prime Minister,
We write regarding your upcoming visit to China, where you will have a valuable opportunity to promote greater Chinese adherence to human rights on a number of important domestic and international issues. With the 16th round of the UK-China human rights dialogue set to begin at the end of January, Human Rights Watch expects these issues will play a prominent role in your discussions with the Chinese leadership.
Human Rights Watch continues to document serious human rights abuses inside China. The adoption of a new labor contract law, an increasing degree of personal freedom, and a review of the death penalty are, as Lord Malloch-Brown noted last week, small steps in the right direction, though they should not be mistaken for the kind of significant, systemic change of which the Chinese government is capable. In the months prior to the 2008 Beijing Olympics, however, we believe that there is a unique opportunity to press for change. Your government’s rhetorical commitments to promoting human rights in China must now be matched by concrete action.
We ask that you raise three domestic human rights issues during your visit.
In December 2006, the Chinese government unveiled new temporary regulations designed to give accredited foreign journalists expanded freedoms in the run-up to and during the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. That decision appeared to mark a significant easing of the tight official controls on reporting activities that have long constrained foreign correspondents’ freedom of expression in China. However, Human Rights Watch research indicates that these regulations are being persistently flouted and that foreign journalists, including British journalists, continue to be routinely harassed, detained and intimidated by Chinese government officials, security forces and plainclothes thugs who appear to operate at official behest. Meanwhile, Chinese journalists and foreign correspondents, researchers, and translators and assistants continue to risk potentially vicious reprisals from state agencies for reporting that does not conform with the dictates of the official propaganda system. We are aware that you have already asked the Chinese government to uphold the temporary regulations, make them permanent, and extend them to Chinese journalists. If significant improvement and specific commitments have not materialized by April 1, we believe it is appropriate for you and senior members of your government to decline invitations to attend the opening and closing ceremonies. As an Olympic host and a promoter of human rights globally, it is especially important for the United Kingdom to set and defend such standards.
Given Lord Malloch-Brown’s recent comments on the Chinese government’s use of house arrest and extrajudicial detention as “serious problems,” and given DFID’s nearly decade-old efforts to fight HIV/AIDS in China, we urge you to insist on an opportunity to meet with Hu Jia, the recently re-imprisoned HIV/AIDS activist and government critic, on your upcoming visit. Hu Jia has been repeatedly subject to house arrest and other forms of government harassment. He was arrested at his Beijing apartment on December 27, 2007, on “suspicion of incitement to subvert state power.” Since that time, his wife, Zeng Jinyan, has endured virtual house arrest and harassment from police surrounding their home. In our experience, visits from foreign leaders such as yourself bring these kinds of critics an important degree of protection, and we are aware that you have in the past at least raised individuals’ cases with the Chinese government. The detention of Hu Jia is a continuation of a pattern of harassment of AIDS activists and related repressive policies that we fear will intensify in the coming months to the detriment of both human rights and China’s efforts to combat the HIV/AIDS epidemic.
Your government last week lamented the lack of attention to “developments in China’s legislative framework to provide greater protection for the rights of its citizens,” and continues to fund rule of law projects in China. Human Rights Watch will soon release a comprehensive report that documents physical abuse, arbitrary professional sanctions and criminal prosecutions against Chinese lawyers in retaliation for their efforts to secure justice for victims of official abuse. Such abuses cannot be dismissed as idiosyncratic, but demonstrate the Chinese Communist Party’s concerted efforts to prevent the judiciary from becoming an effective check on power. Your government has repeatedly acknowledged the importance of an independent legal system in which lawyers play a key role in ordinary citizens’ ability to access government. We ask that you make lawyers’ arbitrarily arrest, detention, or supervision because of their professional activities as human rights defenders a prominent topic at the upcoming human rights dialogue.
The Chinese government is not only in a position to influence human rights inside its own borders. As it has reinvigorated its diplomacy and dramatically increased the reach of its foreign aid and international trade, its choices have an immediate effect on some of the world’s most pressing human rights crises. In a recent House of Lords debate, your government and members from across the political spectrum agreed that China can and should be asked to take more specific action with regard to particular human rights crises. We ask that you raise three foreign policy issues in your discussions.
The Chinese government has shown that, when it is willing, it is able to make a substantial contribution to improving the situation in Darfur. China’s support for Security Council Resolution 1769, authorizing the United Nations/African Union hybrid peacekeeping force for Darfur (UNAMID), and its relatively public pressure on Khartoum to accept the force has made deployment of UNAMID possible. As China seeks a role as a responsible member of the international community, it should further use its considerable influence over the government of Sudan, as well as its position as a permanent member of the Security Council, to contribute to long-term stability and prosperity in Sudan by pressing the government of Sudan to end its abusive policies, particularly its ongoing obstruction of deployment of the peacekeeping force and its refusal to cooperate with the International Criminal Court. You should urge the Chinese government to issue a public statement condemning Sudan's deliberate obstruction of the peacekeeping force. In addition, China should be encouraged to supply critical units that are still being sought for the force, including the urgently needed helicopter units.
Most of the world responded to the Burmese military government’s crackdown on peaceful demonstrations by monks in September and October 2007 with condemnation. China has helped facilitate visas for UN envoys Ibrahim Gambari and Paolo Pinheiro. But this pales in comparison to the Chinese government’s continued sale of weapons to Burma and its abusive military. You should urge your Chinese counterparts to suspend all weapons transfers, which could make Beijing complicit in the Burmese government’s continued use of child soldiers, war crimes against ethnic minority populations, and the army’s use of lethal force against peaceful demonstrators. In addition, you should ask China to promote international involvement in crises such as Burma by speaking publicly not just about the need for dialogue and reconciliation, but also about ongoing repression. That China’s significant voice is not heard on human rights issues allows the Burmese government to exploit the lack of a unified position among key international actors.
Finally, we note that the UK and China have recently begun a bilateral dialogue to better coordinate their aid to Africa and we applaud this step. As you know, China gives aid unconditionally to governments regardless of their human rights records. In some circumstances such a strategy is not problematic; in others, however, the Chinese aid undermines those donors who are trying to leverage governmental assistance to improve human rights. At a time when the UK needs to redouble its own efforts in effectively linking human rights and aid in countries such as Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria, and Rwanda, it can also make a significant contribution by encouraging greater Chinese transparency regarding its own aid. If Beijing’s aid is not underwriting human rights violations or violators, then—like other developed countries—it should have nothing to hide.
We believe that your visit is not only an ideal opportunity to raise these domestic and international human rights concerns, but also for you to demonstrate in a concrete manner your government’s commitment to the promotion of human rights worldwide. We welcome the opportunity to discuss these issues with you upon your return.
Sincerely,
Tom Porteous
London Director
Sophie Richardson
Asia Advocacy Director
