China Tries to Head Off Human Rights Critics

In a move clearly meant to defuse an annual U.N. debate over its human rights record, China has announced it will sign one of two key human rights treaties by year’s end, state-run media here said Tuesday.

Meeting with French Defense Minister Charles Millon on Monday, President Jiang Zemin committed China to joining the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which guarantees nondiscrimination, the right of workers to form unions, and fair distribution of natural resources, the official New China News Agency reported.

But the Chinese leader stopped short of endorsing a second accord on civil and political rights, viewed by human rights advocates as the more significant of the two. The U.S. has ratified that agreement and signed but not ratified the pact on economic, social and cultural rights.

Nonetheless, Tuesday’s announcement in Beijing is expected to shore up China’s position as it seeks to avoid censure before the U.N. Commission on Human Rights, now in session in Geneva. Denmark, backed by the United States, vowed on Monday to introduce a resolution condemning China for human rights abuses in what has become a yearly showdown between Washington and Beijing since 1989, when the Chinese government crushed pro-democracy demonstrators in Tiananmen Square.

Analysts say that China, with the support of smaller developing nations, would have little trouble defeating such a motion at the 53-member forum, as it has in years past.

Indeed, even before Jiang’s announcement, sources on both sides of the controversy said this week that a face-off between China and the U.S. this year would probably be their last in Geneva, as the West bows to China’s burgeoning economic power.

Chinese officials say Washington has agreed to stop pressing for U.N. censure of China’s human rights record after this year. Although the Clinton administration denies that claim, others familiar with the debate say privately that the fight is over.

“In practical terms, that’s probably right,” said a Western diplomat based here. “Surely in Washington they’re toting up what they can afford to expend even to get this” proposal on the table, as key allies such as France and Germany back off from tougher stands on human rights in favor of strengthening economic ties with China.

“There is decreasing momentum each year for this resolution,” another Western official said. “We’re getting further and further away from 1989.”

The U.S. and Britain have declared support for the Danish initiative but have found other West European countries gun-shy. France last week said it preferred dialogue to confrontation, exposing a rift within the European Union, which in previous years criticized China’s human rights practices with one voice. Germany, Spain and Italy have also distanced themselves from the resolution.

Since the Tiananmen crackdown, Beijing has spent millions of dollars courting smaller developing nations for favorable votes on the human rights issue as well as on other sensitive topics, such as blocking Taiwan’s move toward independence from the mainland. Two years ago, China came close to losing its bid to sink the U.N. resolution, eking out a one-vote victory over a coalition of Western countries led by the U.S.

Now the growing hunger of Western nations for greater access to China’s 1.2 billion consumers has forced those nations to back off, to the dismay of human rights advocates.

Xiao Qiang, executive director of the New York-based group Human Rights in China, said an end to the yearly U.N. debate would deprive activists of an important tool for training the spotlight on China, where many dissidents remain jailed and certain freedoms are still restricted.

“It’s a serious setback, because persistent pressure by the U.N. [human rights] commission has forced China to face the international community year after year, and that has impact in the long run,” Xiao said by telephone from Geneva. “If we lose this, we’re losing leverage to set up the moral parameters for China’s political transition” after the death of senior leader Deng Xiaoping in February.

Paul Harris, who heads the Hong Kong Human Rights Monitor, expressed doubt that China will actually commit to the treaty, saying Jiang’s pledge did not make clear whether Beijing will fully ratify it.

“The timing is obviously designed to reduce the risk of China being condemned in the debate at the United Nations,” Harris said.

Shen Guofang, spokesman for China’s Foreign Ministry, warned Copenhagen on Monday that relations would be “severely damaged” if it went forward with its motion.

“If Denmark insists on doing this, it will end up as the biggest loser,” Shen said. “I can say relations will be severely damaged in the political or economic and trade areas.”

China still faces a contest in the U.S. Congress when its most-favored-nation trading status comes up for renewal--another perennial battle over human rights, complicated this year by allegations that Beijing tried to influence U.S. elections through political donations.