Americans Press China on Religious Freedom : Rights: Lawmakers urge the release of 77 church leaders and lobbying on their behalf by U.S. Christians.

U.S. politicians and church leaders are gearing up to exert more pressure on China to respect religious freedom and release prisoners of conscience, two U.S. congressmen said here Thursday.

Reps. Frank R. Wolf (R-Va.) and Christopher H. Smith (R-N.J.) said they met earlier in the day with Premier Li Peng and gave him a letter, signed by 110 members of Congress, calling for the release of 77 Protestant and Catholic leaders believed to be imprisoned or under house arrest. Nearly all of those listed were arrested in the last few years, many of them last year.

“We respectfully--yet firmly--asked Premier Li that these innocent men and women be set free, for surely the unfettered practice of one’s religious faith is an internationally recognized human right and cannot be construed to be a crime,” Smith said at a news conference at the U.S. Embassy.

The congressmen said they also called for the release of students and intellectuals imprisoned after the June 4, 1989, military crackdown on pro-democracy protests in Beijing, and urged that coercive features of China’s strict family planning program be eliminated.

The congressmen expressed belief that outside pressure on these issues can contribute to change in China.

“We’re just going to be hopeful and see what happens,” Wolf said, explaining that Li told them “he was going to look at this letter . . . and he was going to ask the Justice Department to look at it.”

Wolf said that in addition to attempts by some members of Congress to use trade legislation to pressure China on human rights, plans are under way to boost efforts by American churches to lobby Chinese leaders on behalf of imprisoned Christians.

“I met last week with the moderator of the Presbyterian Church,” Wolf said. “We’re also going to meet with or write to all the leaders of all the churches in the U.S.--the Methodist, the Episcopalian, the Baptist, the Unitarians, the Catholics--and we’re going to ask them to send delegations . . . to come over here and raise these cases. Basically, the program is almost what has been done in Eastern Europe--the adoption of prisoners of conscience, things like that.”

The Chinese constitution guarantees freedom to believe in religion and “freedom not to believe in religion.” All religious activity, however, must be conducted under government-controlled religious organizations. It is illegal for Catholic church leaders to express allegiance to the Pope, and it is illegal for Christians to proselytize among the general public or hold unapproved worship services.

China has about 4 million Protestants and 3.3 million Catholics who are associated with government-approved churches, according to official figures. Reports based on contacts with the Christian underground often estimate that at least as many believers are associated with these illegal churches, but it is impossible to confirm these figures.

Smith said that with the improvement of U.S.-Soviet ties, there is less need for the United States to have good relations with China as a counterweight to Soviet power. This strategic change and the 1989 Beijing massacre have led to a situation where human rights has become the central issue in Sino-U.S. relations, he said.

“Mutual economic cooperation in the 1990s will be enhanced by adherence to, or harmed by negligence to, internationally recognized human rights standards,” Smith said.

Wolf and Smith noted that China’s human rights record will be a key issue during congressional debate later this year over whether to renew China’s low-tariff trading status as a “most-favored nation.”

“I think there’s an unrealistic expectation on the part of the Chinese . . . that they’re just going to get MFN . . . and it will be business as usual,” Smith said. “We tried to confront that fallacy. . . . Without progress (on rights), it is in very serious jeopardy.”