Congress Approves Stiffer Terms on Trade With China : Diplomacy: Final vote follows a secret Senate session on reports on missile sales. A veto by Bush is likely.

Defying President Bush’s veto warnings, Congress gave final approval Tuesday to a bill that would require China to improve its record on human rights, trade barriers and missile sales to retain its most-favored-nation trading status.

The Senate passed the legislation on a 59-39 roll call vote. That was a wider margin against Bush’s China policy than the 55-44 majority that opponents achieved on a similar bill last summer. But it still fell short of the two-thirds majority that would be needed to make the bill law over Bush’s veto.

The legislation passed the House last November, 409 to 21.

The Senate vote came after a 90-minute secret Senate session to discuss the latest U.S. intelligence reports on Chinese sales of missiles and nuclear technology to Iran, Syria and other nations in the Middle East.

While senators refused to discuss the closed-door debate, it may have persuaded some lawmakers to switch their positions on the legislation, which calls for China to meet specific conditions before its most-favored-nation trade status would be renewed.

“We’ve got to send some kind of a signal,” said Sen. J. James Exon (D-Neb.), who changed from supporting Bush’s position to voting to impose new conditions on China’s eligibility for most-favored-nation status. That status permits China to export its goods to the United States at the same low-tariff rates enjoyed by most other countries.

Exon said he was upset by a “chilling report” from the CIA on Chinese missile sales and information discussed in the secret Senate debate. It was the first secret session on intelligence matters in nearly four years.

But Senate supporters of the President accused the Democratic leadership of playing politics with the issue and seeking to undercut Bush’s foreign policy for election-year gains.

“The Democratic leadership, tactically, is trying to undermine the foreign policy leadership of the President at this juncture in the campaign year,” said Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.).

Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.) added that canceling China’s most-favored-nation status would shut off $6 billion in U.S. exports to China and wipe out 100,000 jobs, a move that he termed “cutting off our nose to spite our face.”

Proponents of the legislation contended that the U.S. policy of “constructive engagement” with China’s hard-line leaders has failed to produce sufficient gains in the fields of human rights, trade and missile proliferation.

Senate Majority Leader George J. Mitchell (D-Me.) said, for example, that news reports last week indicated that China may have contracts to sell as much as $1 billion worth of missile and nuclear-related technology to Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria and Pakistan.

Mitchell also denounced China’s human rights record since the 1989 crackdown on demonstrators in Beijing and charged that China subverted U.S. laws to roll up a $12.7-billion trade surplus last year. China exports clothing, shoes, jewelry, toys and electronics to this country.

The bill would require Bush to certify that China has released citizens who joined the pro-democracy demonstrations in Tian An Men Square, stopped the use of prison labor, taken steps to remove trade barriers and accepts limits on its weapons sales. Administration officials have said the practical effect of enacting the bill would be to cancel China’s most-favored-nation privileges because its leaders would refuse to meet the legislation’s conditions.

Bush is expected to veto the bill if it reaches his desk. But the battle may be fought again when the President seeks to extend China’s most-favored-nation status for another year in July.

A total of 50 Democrats and 9 Republicans voted for the bill, while 34 Republicans and 5 Democrats sided with Bush and opposed the measure.

California’s senators split on the issue, with Republican John Seymour backing Bush and Democrat Alan Cranston opposing him.