Beijing Hits Back at U.S. for Raising Rights Concerns

In Rebuttal of State Dept. Report, China Points to Iraq, Guantanamo Abuse Cases

BEIJING, March 8 -- Responding to U.S. complaints, China charged Thursday that the Bush administration has no standing to criticize other countries on human rights because its own record is full of blemishes at home and abroad.

The Chinese accusation, in a retort to the State Department's annual human rights report issued Tuesday, called particular attention to what it said were abuses committed by U.S. soldiers and intelligence agents in Afghanistan and Iraq and at the prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The Chinese also underlined what they described as increased willingness by Washington to spy on its own citizens by monitoring telephone calls, computer connections and travels.

"As in previous years, the State Department pointed the finger at human rights conditions in more than 190 countries and regions, including China, but avoided touching on the human rights situation in the United States," the government said in a report issued by Premier Wen Jiabao's office. "We urge the U.S. government to acknowledge its own human rights problems and stop interfering in other countries' internal affairs under the pretext of human rights."

The Chinese response to U.S. human rights concerns has become a fixture over the last eight years. In the first years, it centered on Beijing's contention that human rights should be defined to include social and economic improvements, such as health care and education, where the Chinese government can point to rapid progress. These arguments were raised again this year, with charges that racial minorities, women and children suffer disadvantages in the United States.

But more recently, the tone of the response has sharpened to reflect increasing reports of U.S. abuses against foreigners suspected of connections to terrorism. These include accusations of kidnapping, torture and imprisonment without legal recourse -- the same abuses often raised by the United States with Chinese authorities.

The latest U.S. official to raise human rights concerns in Beijing was Deputy Secretary of State John D. Negroponte, who visited here over the weekend. In his last job, as President Bush's intelligence coordinator, Negroponte oversaw the Central Intelligence Agency, whose employees are heavily involved in the detentions and interrogations that have come under sharp criticism from human rights organizations. The Chinese government raised similar criticisms in its report.

"The United States has a flagrant record of violating the Geneva Convention in systematically abusing prisoners during the Iraqi War and the War in Afghanistan," it said, adding later: "A Human Rights Watch report in July 2006 said torture and other abuses against detainees in U.S. custody in Iraq were authorized and routine."

The Chinese statement was based largely on reports from U.S. newspapers and international human rights organizations. But it made clear that the United Nations was the source of particular criticism of a new U.S. law, the U.S. Military Commissions Act, which governs how much force may by used in interrogating terrorism suspects.

The Chinese noted that Martin Sheinin, U.N. special rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms, had earlier observed that parts of the act contradict the Geneva Conventions, as well as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.