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From: Frank Wang <frank@hprnls7j.rose.hp.com>
Message-Id: <9509011755.AA19193@hprnls7j.rose.hp.com>
Subject: Re: comments on the letter (fwd)
To: fof
Date: Fri, 1 Sep 95 10:55:54 PDT
Cc: wangh1@nextwork.rose-hulman.edu, rwy@netcom.com, junnan@sage.cc.purdue.edu,
liuc, yanli@cs.ust.hk, csprc, cissy@cs.uh.edu, xzhang@cctr.umkc.edu
Priority: High
Mailer: Elm [revision: 70.85]
Hi Guys, this article is a little bit long, but worth to read:
==================================================================
Let's discuss and maybe write a letter together to newspapers. This is not
politics but fairness. Please make suggestions, criticisms.
- --Daqing
- --------------------------------
The US-China Relation Should Not Be Derailed By Harry Wu
Since the arrest and release by the Chinese government of Mr. Harry Wu, the US
media hailed him as the champion of human rights in China. In the minds of
many of Americans, Harry Wu is risking his freedom or even his life to save
the dissidents like him still in China's prison system. During an interview
with CBS 60 minutes after his release, Mr. Wu said he did and, is willing to
violate Chinese laws, 'communist laws', such as impersonation of a policeman,
to expose the human rights violations in China's prison systems.
With all the media attention, however, we haven't yet seen any evidence that
any of the criminals in the prisons Mr. Wu visited are political dissidents,
have we?. Although we do have a list of names of political dissidents detained
by the Chinese government, we haven't heard a single name of a political
dissident who was executed and whose organ was used in a transplant, despite
Mr. Wu's numerous trips to many prisons in China, have we? Since Mr. Wu
impersonated a policeman to enter prisons, and he filmed flocks of prisoners,
we wonder why it is so difficult to give just one such name or case. Mr. Wu
also claims that there are Nazi style concentration camps in China, where
people are treated as the Nazis treated the Jewish people, also without any
factual support.
One of the American ideals is 'to presume innocent until proven guilty'. We
see the whole nation spend so much time and energy to make sure O.J. Simpson
gets a fair trial. But on charges of execution of political prisoners and
extraction of organs from them, China is already guilty without any concrete
evidence. These charges by Mr. Wu, however, are highly inflammatory and is
greatly affecting the US-China relations, and he does not contribute to any
positive solution.
We agree that China has many problems, and prison human right violations
exist and should be corrected. Equally important is to realize that China
has changed enormously during the past ten to fifteen years, under the open
door policy. China is not an evil empire as Mr. Wu described. Mr. Wu's
concept of today's China is grossly outdated, where the concept of communism is
next to an empty name. China is fully embracing market economy. Political
indoctrination is replaced by entrepreneurship and innovation. Although far
from being a democracy, China is far different from the China from the
50's to the 70's when Mr. Wu was first arrested. China's open door policy
has resulted not only in the implementation of market economy but also in
the transformation of China's social and political structure. Intellectuals,
professionals or technocrats, rather than revolutionaries, play a more and
more important roles in society. This is the side of China that Americans
should not ignore. It is exactly the reform since the late 70's that led to
the release of people like Mr. Wu.
Different countries have very different criminal justice systems and we
agree that that of China is not up to the Western standard. It is unfortunate
that murderers and rapists are not treated as nicely in China as in the US.
Under the influence of Mr. Wu's hype on the problems in prison systems in China,
in one TV report, Mabel Jong of CNBC said China executed 16 activists
who are considered security risk for the UN women's conference. Wait,wait,this
is completely out of hand. If China executed political prisoners to oppress
dissent before an international conference, the world deserves a more detailed
description than just the number of 16 people and we would ask why the world
did not demand the UN to cancel the conference. If this is not true, it is
just as tragic that the misrepresented image of China is affecting the
ability of the US to pursue the strategic and economic interests of both
the US and China. In a world with conflicts in Bosnia and Chechnya, with
the threat of proliferation of weapon of mass destruction, US relations with
the most populous nation on earth should not rise and fall based on how
China treats China's Charles Mason, Jeffrey Dalmer, and murderers of girls
like Polly Klass. If the US could cooperate with China since the 70's to
pursue world peace and to open China's door towards the West, when China was
far less open and tolerant to political dissent, we don't see why the US
should not help today's China to succeed in economic reform, social
reform and eventually political reform when China is far more open and far
more willing to change her society economically, socially and politically.
We appreciate that one of the American ideals is human rights. Different
countries, however, have different cultural, historic, social, political
backgrounds, and hence have different problems. We appreciate that America
is the most democratic and free society in the world but still she is not
without problems. Imagine if Rodney King's beating tape were made and Mark
Fuhrman's tapes uncovered by someone in a Chinese based, say, Racial Justice
Research Institute, who impersonated a police officer in order to uncover
these human rights violations of LAPD, should the US prosecute this person?
We think the US should. If the Chinese government put the release of this
person and concrete measures to handle racism in LAPD as a condition for
China's buying of Boeing planes or US grains, how would we feel?
The transition from planned economy to market economy results in large number
of unemployment in state owned companies, and the country is trying hard to
maintain stability during rapid changes in every aspect of life in China. In
the minds of Chinese leaders, political dissent is just as or even more
inflammatory as racial issues in the US. Seeing how the former Yugoslavia and
former Soviet Union are doing during their change to democracy and market
economy, we should understand if not support some of the efforts of China in
such a huge, historic transition.
We believe US import of products made by forced prison labor should be banned,
but the whole US relation with China should not be hinged on this single
issue. The interests of Chinese people who are not rapists and murderers,
as well as the interests of Americans, the interests of peoples of the world
should also have their fair weight. The misinformation that China is
executing political prisoners, selling organs of political prisoners for
transplant, and treating people as in Nazi Germany, does not help China's
social, political and economic transformations and does not serve the
interests of the US and peoples of the world.
Daqing Zhao
- --------------------------------------------
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