Regime Watch: Beijing

Jacques Rogge, the chief of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), wants the west to be patient over China’s thuggery. From Saturday’s Financial Times:

Mr Rogge says while he understands the depth of emotion in the west on China’s human rights record, public expectations about the country’s pace of change are unrealistic.

Noting that the People’s Republic of China has only been around since 1949, Mr. Rogge goes on to compare contemporary China to past colonial powers:

Back in 1949, Mr Rogge pointed out, the UK was a colonial power. So too were Belgium, France and Portugal, “with all the abuse attached to colonial powers. It was only 40 years ago that we gave liberty to the colonies. Let’s be a little bit more modest”.

China may not be a role model in the west, Mr Rogge concedes, but “we owe China to give them time”.

Granted, Mr. Rogge was not the IOC president at the time China was granted the 2008 Olympics, but the IOC awarded the Games to Beijing with full knowledge of China’s atrocious human rights record, so now the IOC gets to reap what it sowed.

But as long as Mr. Rogge wants to tell the rest of us what China is “owed,” perhaps he could also tell us all how much longer the people of places like Tibet and Inner Mongolia should be expected to exist under the boot heel of Beijing, or how much longer the Taiwanese should be expected to live with Chinese ballistic missiles pointed at them from across the Taiwan Strait.

China has tried mightily to put on a friendly face for the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, but with the brutal nature of China’s military occupation of Tibet on display to the world, the regime in Beijing is showing its true colors. Tibetans being murdered on the streets of Lhasa and other parts of Tibet by Chinese security forces, an amazingly efficient censorship campaign of video websites such as You tube, and the ousting of foreign journalists from Tibet is all bad enough on its own. But Beijing’s thuggery in Tibet is also a grim indicator of what might be in store for Taiwan should the island-nation ever be “re-unified” with Mainland China.

From my article on this topic in the Boulder Daily Camera (Boulder, Colorado) newspaper from earlier this month:

As with Tibet, China claims sovereignty over democratic Taiwan — even though it is obvious that Taiwan functions as an independent state — and that only Beijing may represent Taiwan’s 23 million citizens in international organizations.

China backs up its claim over Tibet through brute force of military might. Similarly, China backs up its false claim over Taiwan with over 1,300 ballistic missiles pointed at the island from across the Taiwan Strait and the threat of annihilation against the Taiwanese people.

While China has been tyrannizing Tibet for decades, Beijing recently codified its threats of violence against Taiwan, thus giving itself a legal rationalization (at least by totalitarian regime standards) for possible future tyrannization of Taiwan:

Shortly after the People’s Republic of China was formed, Chinese Dictator Mao Tse-Tung sought to “re-unify” Tibet with China. After first invading eastern Tibet in 1950, China pressured Tibetan delegates to sign a 17-point “peaceful liberation” agreement in 1951. Then Mao went ahead and sent People’s Liberation Army soldiers into the capital city of Lhasa and simply tyrannized Tibet by force.

In 2005, Beijing enacted an “Anti-Secession Law” which codified China’s already long-standing threats against Taiwan. Article eight of the law mandates the use of “non-peaceful” means against Taiwan if, among other things, “a major event occurs which would lead to Taiwan’s separation from China.”

As I conclude in the article, what is happening in Tibet makes clear that Beijing is more than willing to back up its threats of violence with the real thing, and should be reason enough for the world to demand an end not only to China’s occupation of Tibet, but also to the regime’s threats of invasion against democratic Taiwan.

The Falun Gong Human Rights Working Group has a new report out on the round-up and torture of Falun Gong practioners by China in advance of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.

An example from the report:

In 2000, at the Changchun Women’s Labor Camp Ms. Zhang was forced to do slave labor, often until midnight, and was beaten and shocked with electric batons. In 2003, just two years after the Communist regime promised to “improve human rights” in order to get the Olympics, Ms. Zhang’s father and brother were tortured to death for practicing Falun Gong. On November 28, 2007, the police arrested Ms. Zhang, and caused her to “disappear.” The authorities refuse to give her family any idea of her whereabouts, or even tell them whether she is still alive.

A quick primer on totalitarian thinking: Since Falun Gong is a spiritual movement, and since totalitarian regimes like the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) cannot tolerate belief systems outside the control of the state, the obvious solution to the popularity of Falun Gong in China is to round up its practitioners, torture them and then “disappear” them.

And yes, these guys actually get to host the Olympics.

Media advisory on the report here.

Great analysis of Communist China’s fear of Falun Gong here.

On Wednesday, after first dutifully reminding everyone that “The United States recognizes Tibet as part of the People’s Republic of China,” Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte talked semi-tough about China’s thuggish and ongoing crackdown in Tibet in front of the U.S. Senate Foreign Affairs Committee:

The Tibetans have legitimate grievances, stemming from years of repression and Chinese policies that have adversely impacted Tibetan religion, culture and livelihoods. In the months preceding the protests, restrictions on religious freedom were further tightened, leading to increased frustration among the local Tibetan population. In order to be a great and respected power, China will have to make real efforts to guarantee to its own citizens the internationally recognized rights and fundamental freedoms enshrined in China’s own constitution and in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Good stuff so far. Especially considering that the same John Negroponte last year called Taiwan’s planned referendum on United Nations membership a “provocative policy,” thus actually propping up Beijing’s threats of violence against democratic Taiwan.

After the semi-tough talk, Negroponte seemed to slip back into China-appeasement mode:

The Chinese government should seize the opportunity to talk to those Tibetans, represented by the Dalai Lama, who oppose violence and do not seek independence for Tibet. If Beijing does not engage with the Dalai Lama now, it will only serve to strengthen those who advocate extreme views.

If I’m reading this right, a senior U.S. goverment official just referred to those seeking independence from a military occupation by a thuggish Communist regime as advocating “extreme views.” Wow.

Today the Associated Press is reporting that the Chinese Foreign Ministry has confirmed that a Chinese ship full of Chinese arms bound for the Mugabe regime in Zimbabwe will return to China.

Its not that Beijing had a change of heart about arming the Robert Mugabe regime, but rather because neighboring nations refused to allow the ship to dock so the weapons could be off-loaded and delivered to land-locked Zimbabwe.

Here is my original post on this story, including a section on Mugabe’s torture tactics against his opposition.

In other circumstances, a modern day “political education” drive by Communist China might sound like a bad parody on the old “re-education”camps of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia. Unfortuanately for the Tibetans being tyrannized by Beijing, “political education” just sounds like a code phrase for intensifying the ongoing suppression of Tibet.

According to Reuters:

In a bid to reinforce control in Lhasa, Party authorities have launched an education drive focused on officials and Party members, the official Tibet Daily reported on Monday.

The campaign to “fight separatism, protect stability and promote development” would focus on “unifying the thinking and cohesive strength of officials and the masses, deepening the struggle against separatism and counter-attacking the separatist plots of the Dalai clique”, said the paper.

Party members and officials would be assessed on their “performance” in the two-month drive, which will include television programs and organized denunciation sessions.

Organized denunciation sessions? That would make for some compelling television…just before the opening ceremony for the Summer Olympics in Beijing.

This was fast.  Rueters is today reporting that Beijing may recall the Chinese ship carrying Chinese arms bound for the Mugabe regime in Zimbabwe after the ship was denied entry into several African ports. 

According to Reuters:

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said the contract for the shipment was signed last year and was “unrelated to recent developments” in Zimbabwe.

Jiang said the arms shipment was “perfectly normal trade in military goods between China and Zimbabwe,” but because it was impossible for land-locked Zimbabwe to receive the goods, the company may ship the cargo back to China.

Only an authoritarian regime like Communist China would consider arming a murderous thugocracy like Mugabe’s Zimbabwe to be “perfectly normal trade.”

The Central Committee members in Beijing must be furious that the international attention being focused on China’s thuggery in Tibet might be screwing up their arms trade with the other regimes.

Yesterday I posted on a Chinese ship full of Chinese arms docked in South Africa, and bound for the thuggish Robert Mugabe regime in Zimbabwe. Now, the Associated Press is reporting that not only did the ship leave after a judge barred the shipment from transiting South Africa, but also that over the weekend Mozambique denied permission for the ship to dock. Best part is that the Bush Administration may have a hand in all of this. From the AP story:

Two officials said Washington’s effort to block the ship from unloading its cargo was now concentrated on Namibia and Angola and that both countries were being told that allowing the An Yue Jiang to dock could harm their relations with the United States.

It’s good to see the administration be willing to risk upsetting Beijing over its shady dealings with African thugs like Mugabe, especially considering the U.S. State Department’s shameless kowtowing to Beijing over Taiwan’s efforts at United Nations membership

On April 18, The Guardian–a british newspaper–reported on a Chinese cargo ship docked in South Africa loaded with some 77 tons of small-arms, and destined for the Robert Mugabe regime in Zimbabwe.

According to The Guardian’s South Africa correspondent:

A Chinese cargo ship believed to be carrying 77 tonnes of small arms, including more than 3m rounds of ammunition, AK47 assault rifles, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades, has docked in the South African port of Durban for transportation of the weapons to Zimbabwe, the South African government confirmed yesterday. It claimed it was powerless to intervene as long as the ship’s papers were in order.

Copies of the documentation for the Chinese ship, the An Yue Jiang, show that the weapons were sent from Beijing to the ministry of defence in Harare [the capital city of Zimbabwe]. Headed “Dangerous goods description and container packing certificate”, the document was issued on April 1, three days after Zimbabwe’s election. It lists the consignment as including 3.5m rounds of ammunition for AK47 assault rifles and for small arms, 1,500 40mm rockets, 2,500 mortar shells of 60mm and 81mm calibre, as well as 93 cases of mortar tubes.

It might seem amazingly stupid timing on Beijing’s part to be supplying arms to one of Africa’s most atrocious authoritarian regimes only months before the opening of the Olympics in Beijing. But arming, and otherwise propping up African thugocracies is business as usual for Beijing. As The Guardian continues:

Despite international criticism, the Chinese government has been a longstanding backer of Zimbabwe president Robert Mugabe’s authoritarian regime, supplying it with jet fighters, military vehicles and guns. China, or Chinese businesses, are reported to have sold radio-jamming devices to prevent independent stations from contradicting the state-controlled media, and have signed vital agriculture deals.

The Beijing/Mugabe arms story broke at about the same time as a new report by Human Rights Watch on torture camps being set up in Zimbabwe to punish opposition party memebers who voted against Mugabe and his ZANU-PF party in last month’s elections.

According to the April 19 Human Rights Watch report:

During the day, ZANU-PF and their allies (so-called “war veterans,” youth militias and some armed men in military uniform) gather at these camps to decide on their targets, generally those known or thought to support the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). According to witnesses, the targets are then rounded up and brought to the camps at night, where they are beaten for hours with thick wooden sticks and army batons. Human Rights Watch has interviewed more than 30 people in the last two days who have sustained serious injuries, including broken limbs, as a result of these beatings.

Zimbabwe’s parliamentary elections on March 29, 2008 delivered a decisive defeat for the ruling ZANU-PF led by Robert Mugabe. Yet, nearly three weeks later, the ZANU-PF-appointed Election Commission has failed to announce the results of the presidential poll that took place at the same time.

ZANU-PF officials are calling the crackdown Operation Makavhoterapapi, or “Where did you put your cross?” There seem to be two aims to this organized violence: to punish people for having voted for the MDC and to intimidate them to vote for ZANU-PF if there is a presidential run-off. One victim told Human Rights Watch: “They told me that next time you will vote wisely, now you know what we can do.”

If there is a run-off election in Zimbabwe, maybe next instead of wooden sticks and batons, Mugabe’s thugs will be using Chinese-made AK-47s.

With China’s thuggish occupation of Tibet on display to the world, Beijing is showing its true colors. Read the Krause op-ed, “Misery:  China’s main export” on China’s moral illegitimacy to host the 2008 Summer Olympics.  First published in the excellent Colorado weekly paper, Johnstown Breeze.