US to present anti-China resolution to UN rights committeeAFP March 22, 2004 WASHINGTON (AFP) - The United States will propose a resolution condemning China at the ongoing session of the United Nations Human Rights Commission, the State Department said. The United States "is disappointed" with China's failure to meet its commitments on human rights and would introduce the resolution at the ongoing UN meeting in Geneva, Richard Boucher, the department's spokesman, told reporters. Officials in Washington had strongly hinted earlier this month that the United States would sponsor the resolution at the commission, a 53-member UN body which began its six-week annual session on March 15. But Chinese officials reportedly had spoken several times with their US counterparts, including Scretary of State Colin Powell and national security adviser Condoleezza Rice discourage Washington from doing it. "Our goal in sponsoring this resolution is to encourage China to take positive, concrete steps to meet its international obligations to protect human rights of the Chinese people," Boucher said on Monday. He said China had not kept its word it gave to Washington during a dialogue in 2002 on respecting human rights, saying he was concerned "backsliding" by Beijing. Boucher said the United States was also calling on other countries within the commission to join it in moving the resolution. The United States broke with tradition last year by not sponsoring a resolution at the annual meeting in Geneva, a move analysts said was motivated by Washington's wish for China's cooperation on the North Korean nuclear issue, the Iraq war and anti-terrorism. But the United States recently accused Beijing of backsliding on its avowed commitment to human rights, as arrests of democracy activists and extrajudicial killings continued unabated during 2003, according to the US State Department's annual rights assessment issued last month. Also targetted were labor protesters, defense lawyers, journalists, church members and "others seeking to take advantage of the space created by reforms," according to the US report. In return, China published its own scathing attack on human rights in the United States. -------------------------- |