28 March 2000
Koh Responds to Questions about U.S.-Sponsored China Resolution
(Good chance China's "no action-motion" will be defeated) (620) By Wendy Lubetkin Washington File European Correspondent Geneva -- The United States believes bringing China to account for its human rights conduct at this year's Commission on Human Rights would send an important signal that there is no double standard at the world's most important human rights forum. At a March 28 press briefing, Harold Hongju Koh, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, said that human rights conditions in China have deteriorated markedly over the past year. That is why the United States, he said, "saw no option" but to sponsor a resolution on China. Koh said he was hopeful that this year China would not be able to elude consideration of its record on human rights at the Commission. For the past decade China has repeatedly used a procedural measure called the "no-action motion" to prevent the 53-member Commission from voting on resolutions about its human rights conduct. "There was only one time when the motion failed, and that was in 1995," Koh said, speaking in response to questions about the U.S. decision to sponsor a China resolution. "We believe that this year the chance that the no-action motion will fail is the greatest since 1995." "The vote count is very close. The European Union has already indicated that they plan to oppose the no-action motion as they have done in the past." Koh said the China resolution is "not a mater of bilateral politics: It is a matter of international principle." "Every country should stand before the Commission and have its human rights record subjected to examination and should not rely on procedural motions to avoid legitimate scrutiny," he said. "We think it is an important moment for the Commission to reaffirm that basic principle, and no better time than in the first Commission of the 21st Century." Koh cited six different areas in which the decline human rights in China has been particularly sharp: -- repression of political dissent; -- suppression of freedom of thought, conscience and religion, including not just Christians, Muslims and Tibetan Buddhists but also the Falun Gong; -- the use of forced and prison labor; -- a decline in human rights conditions in Tibet and an intensified patriotic reeducation campaign against nuns and monks; -- restrictions on the Internet and other forms of freedom of expression; and -- the decline in the situation of women. Asked why no resolution has been tabled on Chechnya, Koh said resolutions are not tabled until mid-April and the members of the commission are still discussing the issue. He noted that most of the distinguished speakers who have addressed the Commission expressed concern about Chechnya. "We recognize," Koh said, "that the government of Russia has legitimate concerns about territorial sovereignty and about terrorism, but that does not justify indiscriminate shelling of civilians, it does not justify obstructing humanitarian access or human rights monitors from coming in, and that there have been credible allegations of extrajudicial killings that we believe must be subjected to a full, free and fair investigation." Koh noted that the Russians have invited High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson to visit both Moscow and Chechnya from March 31 to April 5, and that Robinson will report to the Commission on her findings on her return. "I think a large number of members of the Commission will be very anxiously awaiting her report, and will decide how the Commission itself ought to respond on that basis." (The Washington File is a product of the Office of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: usinfo.state.gov)
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