Union advised to forget human rights in China arms ban talks

By David Cronin

Date: 10/02/05

EU diplomats advised late last year that the Union bow to Chinese demands that the future of the arms embargo be separated from the country's human rights record in discussions with the Beijing government, European Voice has learnt.

In a paper prepared for the Union's Dutch presidency, diplomats preparing for the December 2004 EU-China summit stated that any reference to the need to make the lifting of the ban conditional on progress in reducing repression was "bound to be immediately rejected by the Chinese side". This confidential advice differed from the position agreed by EU foreign ministers the previous month. It said that the Chinese should be given "a positive message" at the summit on their demand that the ban be rescinded "but they should understand that progress would be needed in other areas before the embargo could be lifted." Human rights, relations with Taiwan and a revision of the EU's code of conduct on arms sales were listed as the 'other areas'.

But ahead of the summit, the diplomats advised that there should be no specific reference to human rights in the section on the arms embargo - imposed following the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre - in the joint communiqué issued after the summit. Instead, the diplomats said that human rights were "to be dealt with extensively in speaking points" prepared for the EU delegation, "where specific questions of human rights (plight of religious minorities, Tibet, Tiananmen) will be addressed".

No reference to human rights was made in the summit's conclusions.

Although Condoleezza Rice, the US secretary of state, raised American concerns about how scrapping the embargo could exacerbate tensions across the Taiwan Straits during her visit to Europe this week, the widespread expectation is that it will be lifted in April or May.

Dick Oosting, director of Amnesty International's Brussels office, said it was a "shame" that the EU was willing to scrap the embargo, without "anything in return". While he recognised that progress had been made in "opening up the media and with social and labour standards", he said such human rights abuses as torture, use of the death penalty and suppression of free expression remained rife.

"If you impose an arms embargo because of a human rights disaster 15 years ago and then your counterpart says this has nothing to do with human rights, do you accept that?" he asked. "What signal does that send to human rights activists, victims and the families of victims?"

But a spokesman for China's EU embassy said Beijing could not accept any link between the arms embargo and human rights questions. Describing the ban as "discrimination," the spokesman said the conditions applying in 1989 no longer existed. "China has made a lot of progress in the human rights field," he added. "The death penalty is a complicated problem because we have a vast population. But we have started to discuss the problem - we have had a Europe-China human rights dialogue 18 times."

Article reports that EU diplomats preparing the December 2004 EU-China summit advised that the Union bow to Chinese demands that the future of the arms embargo be separated from the country's human rights record in discussions with the Beijing government.