Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton Note 'Vigorous Disagreement' Over Human Rights As China Dialogue Begins

WASHINGTON -- As the United States opened two days of talks with China Monday, Vice President Joe Biden lauded the growing political ties between the world's two largest economies but emphasized that the Obama administration remains deeply concerned about continuing human rights violations in China.

"We have vigorous disagreement in the area of human rights," Biden said as the third annual U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue got underway. "We have to be honest with each other," he added, noting the recent arrests and disappearances of Chinese journalists, human rights lawyers, bloggers, writers and artists.

Biden allowed that many Chinese people consider America's preoccupation with human rights in their country to be an "intrusion" into internal matters that "rankles" the country's leaders. Yet, he insisted, "no relationship that’s real can be built on a false foundation."

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton also spoke out about the "candid discussions" she and other U.S. officials intend to have over the next two days about human rights, as Chinese Vice Premier Wang Qishan and State Councilor Dai Bingguo looked on silently from the stage of the Interior Department auditorium.

As the officials spoke, about two dozen protesters chanted "Shame on China!" and held signs outside the building that read "China -- Stop Military Crackdown in Ngaba, Tibet!"

"We know over the long arc of history that societies that work toward respecting human rights are going to be more prosperous, stable and successful," Clinton said. "That has certainly been proven time and time again, but most particularly in the last months" as calls for more freedom and democracy have erupted across the Middle East.

Dai downplayed any friction, recalling that this year marks the 40th anniversary of "Ping-Pong Diplomacy," and the start of improved U.S.-China relations, which had been severed for more than 20 years after the Communist takeover of China.

"I welcome more American friends to visit China to see and feel for yourselves the friendship of the Chinese people and the importance of China-U.S. relations," he said through an interpreter. "You may learn firsthand the enormous progress China has made on various fronts, including human rights."

But Jeffrey Bader, a China expert at the Brookings Institution, said nervousness over the Arab Spring uprisings and fears of similar upheavals at home have spurred recent crackdowns.

Despite recent discussions in which U.S. officials "took a thoughtful approach of stressing issues of concern to Chinese people and groups, mitigating the risks of appearing to be imposing U.S. customs and norms on a suspicious China," Bader expects few concrete results to emerge from this week's summit.

"History encourages modest expectations about the fruits of U.S.-China dialogue on human rights," he wrote. "The Chinese see this as an issue to be dealt with domestically and managed internationally, not as one where they need to accommodate foreign complaints."

This week's talks are the result of an agreement in 2009 between President Barack Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao. More than a dozen U.S. agency heads will meet with their Chinese counterparts, including Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, Commerce Secretary Gary Locke, and Labor Secretary Hilda Solis.

The summit also features the first high-level military-to-military talks between the two countries, with China sending two top generals as well as non-uniformed military leaders to engage with their counterparts at the Pentagon.

Obama is scheduled to meet with leaders of the Chinese delegation later Monday, when he is expected to raise the subject of human rights and particular cases of activists being arrested or disappearing.

But Douglas Paal, who directed Asian Affairs on the National Security Council staffs of Presidents Reagan and George H. W. Bush and is now Vice President for Studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, expects Chinese officials will want to talk about other things.

"The Chinese will say we just discussed that, let’s move on," he said.

Comments

[bro0klyn59]

08:58 AM on 05/16/2011

True , china's human rights issues are questionable . that said . untill that no tell motel is shut down on the tip of cuba , joe and hillary's words have no value .

[Tommy Hawksblood]

04:40 AM on 05/16/2011

The First thing Tibet is getting smaller every day. Yes China will stop but they will have finished the job first. We are not talking about people that should not be there we are talking about people that live there. One of the most spiritual places on the planet is under attack. What does the US do borrow more money from the people doing the attacking. That sounds very sick to me. Taking over the spiritual people, what kind of country do we live in ? What kind of people do we allow to control us? I would rather die then live like they have to in Tibet.
While this is going on the US will defend any other country for oil and money. The US talks about China while they are sleeping with the enemy. I really hate to say I am part of the US. I can say I am part Native making it a little more real then 99% of the people that think they own this country and the ground they walk on . T Hawk

[jalicea2001]

12:34 PM on 05/13/2011

We wouldn't even be having this discussion if we were in China, I am sure of that. American businesses are ok with communist China as long as they keep making huge profits. I would love to see all of the American people who live in China give up their American citizenship if they feel so secure living there.

[alafonse]

07:52 AM on 05/11/2011

The US is the pot calling the Chinese kettle black until we do something about our little ter-ror-ization camp at Gitmo, where people are put at a moment's notice with no legal recourse and no visitors for life.

[MiddleMolly]

11:35 AM on 05/12/2011

Yes and no. If we define "human rights" as the rights of political prisoners and those accused of political crimes, we do have to address the legacy of Gitmo. But I still think that people who are accused and/or convicted of crimes here were are in far better shape than similar people in China.

And, if you are broadly defining "human rights" to mean the way that workers live and are treated, then there is no comparison between China and the US. The US, though, contributes to the plight of Chinese workers by subcontracting the manufacture of popular gadgets and electronics to Chinese firms whose workers labor in conditions that we don't (yet) tolerate in this country.

Chinese workers making iPods:

http://tinyurl.com/4kx5s5u

The human rights of workers all over the world (as the owners of these companies pocket billions of dollars) is a threat to us and to our way of life.

[alafonse]

07:45 PM on 05/10/2011

Oh, wait...we have this nice little torture chamber down in Cuba where people can be kept for a lifetime without any legal recourse, and not even have visitors, and we dare to question another country's human rights? It smacks strongly of the pot calling the kettle black.
I do believe that IF our country had the 1.2 billion people that China has, our attitudes could possibly be different. And I think that one should be very careful about criticizing the nation that is second in line in holding our debt.

[budgood]

05:03 PM on 05/10/2011

The sentiment of her speech was entirely appropriate, but the record of human rights cases in the US that have not been redressed tarnishes the credibility of her position in the eyes of countries like china and rightly so.

the murder of fred Hampton By the FBI in 1969 for example, or the extraordinary rendition of terror suspects who will never stand trail.

We need to be able to deal with these injustices if we are ever to heal as a nation.

[Erewhon7]

06:51 PM on 05/10/2011

1969????
LMAO...

[DAE]

02:32 PM on 05/10/2011

Here in the States everyone tries to wrap themselves in the Stars and Stripes. In China hoisting the Red Flag and invoking Mao amounts to the same thing. There is plenty of criticism of social and economic policies in China. Read this from the website www.maoflag.net. I'm supplying a link that gives an Chinese-English translation from Google Translation of a poem. It also has comments from Chinese netizens. The translation is very, very rough and at times incomprehensible but read through it and you will get the gist. The refrain of the poem is "You can not hatred of the rich it?" which better translated would be, "Can't you hate the rich for that?" The link is: http://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?act=url&hl=en&ie=UTF8&prev=_t&rurl=translate.google.com&sl=zh-CN&tl=en&twu=1&u=http://www.maoflag.net/%3Faction-viewthread-tid-1548835&usg=ALkJrhiz5IZCeIJpUOXH9KG6KFWSWQoIuw

[MiddleMolly]

11:39 AM on 05/12/2011

Fascinating. I would urge all to read at that link... .and don't skip the comments! Some of the comments and the stanzas of the poem sound exactly the same as what people write here in the US.

[DAE]

06:38 PM on 05/13/2011

I've translated the poem and posted it to a new blog that will post articles from the Maoist web. The link is http://eaststillred.blogspot.com/2011/05/song-of-hater-of-rich.html

[Stilyagi]

02:30 PM on 05/10/2011

"The Chinese will say we just discussed that, let’s move on," he said."

And I would reply "Then can you refresh my memory on how we resolved the issue?".

[toadfoot]

11:43 AM on 05/10/2011

How about we start by being "honest with ourselves". The U.S government has, and perhaps still is, engaged in torture... if not directly then by proxy. We've no right to question the human rights behavior of other nations when former and current members of our own government and military are permitted to escape answering for their own crimes. The undeniable facts are that in the past we tried and executed those responsible for the very same acts that have been committed by those representing us. And lest we forget, the claim that "I was ordered to do it" was not considered a valid defense then and shouldn't be now. Neither is ignorance of the applicable international laws, although in our case it seems more like willful ignorance.

[mashtoe]

03:16 PM on 05/10/2011

Toadfoot, OMG the world isn't perfect. What a shock! The US isn't perfect either! Shocking. Did you sit through 8th grade history and NEVER question why Stalin was our allies?! The problem could be that you watched too many Disney movies.

[Free Your Mind]

11:26 AM on 05/10/2011

In the meantime, the race to militarize space to protect future profits of the corporations has already begun:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5mEUtx62N0&feature=related

[osofar]

10:48 AM on 05/10/2011

We are no longer exceptional people...we are deceptional people.

[tksensei]

05:56 PM on 05/10/2011

Who is this "we" you speak of?

[Erewhon7]

06:52 PM on 05/10/2011

By "we" he means "I." We concur.

[DAE]

10:42 AM on 05/10/2011

I've been visiting a variety of "Maoist" sites on the Chinese web. I looked up their URLs and they are mostly based in Beijing. These are not foreign based sites. There are new posts everyday. In fact some of the sites have a range of content similar to Huffpost. There is a wide variety of very critical essays with in depth analysis and many human interest stories. There is extensive criticism of the introduction of genetically modified (GM) food products, especially GM rice. These articles have scathing criticism of the Chinese government for using the Chinese people as guinea pigs. They have "conspiracy" theory advocates who say its all part of a Western Masonic plot to subjugate the developing world and that the government is in collusion with the big corporations like Monsanto. Sound familiar? They have reports in which activists have been attending forums on GM rice and shouting down the government sponsored speakers and scientists. Lots of stories about labor abuses, product tampering, corruption, illegal land grabs, pollution, etc., etc. Many stories about the plight of migrant workers. These articles get many comments, some cursing the capitalist roaders in the CCP (and there are no monitors, some of the language is quite foul). The Chinese authorities allow all of this. Those detained or arrested are not just critics of the government they are agitating for mass demonstrations calling for its overthrow or support groups, such as Falun Gong, that advocate for the overthrow of the government.

[black2deep]

10:31 AM on 05/10/2011

Here is a notion. Lets take care of our own house and let China take care of its house.

[mashtoe]

10:45 AM on 05/10/2011

Right, let's just keep offshoring jobs too.

[Enroh Mot]

11:27 AM on 05/10/2011

Check it out  http://blackagendareport.com

[thetxsndn]

10:16 AM on 05/10/2011

Why can't we just mind our own. Bring our kids home from the middle east, close our farkin borders & tell 'em all to go to heull !

[Erewhon7]

06:53 PM on 05/10/2011

primitive isolationsm.

[bro0klyn59]

10:15 AM on 05/10/2011

Joe biden , hillary clinton ' vigorous disagreement ' over human rights in china ? Is it me ? we , as in america owe china trillions upon trillions of dollars . this is nothing but a side show , dog and pony aka , distraction . true , china's human rights issues are questionable however , what about abuses right here in the good ole usa ? nursing home abuse on our elderly , child sex trafficing , the homeless ? all happening with a blind eye . strange throw , I don't remember hearing china ' vigorous disageeing ' over our own human rights . smoke and mirrors at work people , nice isn't it ?

[mashtoe]

10:47 AM on 05/10/2011

So your point is what? This is really a debate about jobs and trade. Your argument is that China is a free trading partner so then free trade is ok.

[bro0klyn59]

11:11 AM on 05/10/2011

my point is don't point your finger at others being accused of human rights when you are doing the same . free trade is not ok . way back when , ross perot said at the clinton/bush daddy debates , regarding free trade said , ' do you hear that sucking sound ' . china owns us buddy . shouting human rights at china is much like rescusing a dog from a cliff but ignoring the homeless . what's your point ?

[Enroh Mot]

11:21 AM on 05/10/2011

It's not free for people working in US corporate sweatshops in China, and throughout the world.