rotating images House Committee on Foreign Affairs: Republicans: Statement: Opening Remarks of Ranking Member Ros-Lehtinen at Hearing, China on the Eve of the Olympics
House Committee on Foreign Affairs: Republicans: Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Ranking Member

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House Foreign Affairs Committee
U.S. House of Representatives
Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Ranking Republican
 

Opening Remarks of Ranking Member Ros-Lehtinen at Hearing, 

China on the Eve of the Olympics

     
July 23, 2008
 


I would like to welcome the distinguished group of China experts assembled as today’s panel of witnesses. 

Yang Jianli has been a familiar name to me from the days when I joined other Members in seeking to gain his release from a Chinese prison.

 Dr. Yang came to see me last year soon after he was released. 

I look forward to hearing his comments, based on bitter recent personal experience, on the prison system in China and the grave human rights situation there.

I also look forward to the testimony of our other highly respected witnesses.

The convening of the Olympic Games should be an occasion for celebrating good will and sportsmanship for all the people of the world. 

One would wish that the motto of this year’s Olympics:  “one world, one dream” could ring true. 

Unfortunately, when it comes to upholding human rights and the pursuit of democratic values, we remain a world divided with a dream unfulfilled.

China today represents the world’s largest population.

Steeped in a venerable cultural tradition, the Chinese people feel an understandable sense of pride and accomplishment. 

Their economic development in the past two decades has been nothing short of remarkable. 

But the Chinese people have paid a very high price for these accomplishments. 

More than pollution fills the air of this Beijing summer. 

A people yearning to breathe free are covered by a dark cloud of oppression which hangs over Tiananmen Square-- site of a great nation’s broken dream. 

For that midsummer night’s dream, symbolized by the goddess of democracy, was crushed. 

And the dream transformed into a nightmare on that long night when the tanks rolled into the square.

The Chinese leaders then made their pact with the devil, purchasing continued absolute political power with the blood shed by their very own people. 

And this same communist leadership remains cynically manipulative even to this day. 

The Chinese leadership pledged that the hosting of the Games would be accompanied by a long-delayed improvement in the human rights situation. 

They told the statesmen of the world that they would be a responsible stakeholder as a new leader among the community of nations.

But these have proved equally empty words to conceal more broken dreams. 

Ask the victims of genocide in Darfur about China’s destructive policies with the regime in Sudan that is responsible for so much death and suffering in Darfur.

Ask the people of Burma, whose Saffron Revolution was suppressed last year with the aid of Chinese-made weapons. 

Ask the North Korean refugees making their way along a perilous underground railroad through China, while living in constant fear of detection.

Ask the people of Tibet who felt the heavy boots of the People’s Liberation Army pressing down on their throats this past spring.

Or ask the Muslim Uyghur community, labeled with the broad brush of “splittist” as Beijing conducts a pre-Olympics security sweep.

Has Beijing been a responsible stakeholder for any of these-- among the world’s most vulnerable populations?
China’s security operations are in high gear for the suppression of human rights on the eve of the Olympics. 

I am especially concerned, as I noted in a letter earlier this year to Secretary of State Rice, that U.S. citizens who feel strongly about human rights issues will be caught up in the Chinese police dragnet once they arrive in Beijing for the Games. 

Finally, I would like to underscore the legitimate security issues relating to our longtime friend, democratic Taiwan. 

Over a thousand Chinese missiles are aimed today at the people of Taiwan.

In this regard, I found Admiral Keating’s remarks at the Heritage Foundation last week that there was, in fact, “a freeze” on arms sales to Taiwan to be cause for concern.


Even more disturbing was the Admiral’s indication that the Chinese leadership had some input in Administration decisions about Taiwan’s defensive needs. 

The Taiwan Relations Act gives Congress a clear role in the provision of defensive weapons to Taiwan. 

President Reagan’s “Six Assurances” to Taiwan, a solemn commitment made over a quarter century ago, makes it clear that there should be no pre-consultation with Beijing on this matter.

Last year, the House adopted a resolution I put forward which declared “that it shall continue to be the policy of the United States, consistent with the Taiwan Relations Act, to make available to Taiwan such defense articles and services as may be necessary for Taiwan to maintain a sufficient self-defense capability.”

On this matter there can be no backsliding or compromise.

I welcome the views of our panelists on Admiral Keating’s statement and other vital issues in U.S.-China relations on the eve of the Olympics, including the human rights matters I have raised.