Dharamsala, Feb. 13 – Human rights groups today sent a letter to Hillary Clinton urging her to push for improvement of human rights situation in China on her first visit to China as U.S. Secretary of State.
“Tibetans and Uighurs continue to suffer indiscriminate crackdowns on their rights, typically on the grounds that their peaceful calls for genuine autonomy are in fact a cover for ‘separatist activity’. You should press Beijing to end the criminalization of peaceful advocacy and to engage in constructive dialogue over the future of both regions,” the letter read.
International Campaign for Tibet, Amnesty International, Human Rights in China, Freedom House and Reporters Without Borders, urged Clinton to raise sensitive issues such as crackdowns in Tibet and Xinjiang and press censorship, arguing these would benefit U.S. interests.
“This will be the crucial moment to signal to the Chinese government that the quality of its relationship with the United States will depend in part on whether it lives by universally accepted human rights norms in its domestic and foreign policies. Sending such a signal in Beijing will be especially important given the United States’ unfortunate absence from China’s Universal Periodic Review on February 9 at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. Most important, the Obama administration has pledged to return the United States to a position of leadership in defending human rights; doing so with a rising power such as China will be a key test of that commitment.”
The groups wrote that China’s stringent control of mass media and the internet allows it to stoke nationalist anger against the United States in moments of crisis. “The export from China of internet-censoring technologies and its provision of unconditional aid to repressive regimes increases the US’s burdens in fighting censorship and human rights crises worldwide.”
As First Lady, Mrs. Clinton spoke boldly on human rights issues during a 1995 visit to Beijing at a forum on women’s issues. “It is time for us to say here in Beijing, and the world to hear, that it is no longer acceptable to discuss women’s rights as separate from human rights,” Mrs. Clinton said in a landmark speech at the time, referring to issues such as female infanticide, prostitution and rape.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will leave next week on an eight-day tour of Tokyo, Jakarta, Seoul and Beijing.
