[Congressional Bills 105th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 364 Engrossed in House (EH)]


                 In the House of Representatives, U.S.,

                                                        March 17, 1998.
Whereas the State Department's Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 
        1997 state that ``[t]he Government [of China] continued to commit 
        widespread and well-documented human rights abuses, in violation of 
        internationally accepted norms,'' including extrajudicial killings, the 
        use of torture, arbitrary arrest and detention, forced abortion and 
        sterilization, the sale of organs from executed prisoners, and tight 
        control over the exercise of the rights of freedom of speech, press, and 
        religion;
Whereas, according to the State Department, ``Serious human rights abuses 
        persisted in minority areas [controlled by the Government of China], 
        including Tibet and Xinjiang [East Turkestan], where tight controls on 
        religion and other fundamental freedoms continued and, in some cases, 
        intensified [during 1997]'';
Whereas, according to the 1997 Country Reports, the Government of China enforces 
        its ``one-child policy'' using coercive measures including severe fines 
        of up to several times the annual income of the average resident of 
        China and sometimes punishes nonpayment by destroying homes and 
        confiscating personal property;
Whereas, according to the 1997 Country Reports, as part of the Chinese 
        Government's continued attempts to expand state control of religion, 
        ``Police closed many `underground' mosques, temples, and seminaries,'' 
        and authorities ``made strong efforts to crack down on the activities of 
        the unapproved Catholic and Protestant churches'' including the use of 
        detention, arrest, and ``reform-through-education'' sentences;
Whereas, although the 1997 Country Reports note several ``positive steps'' by 
        the Chinese Government such as signing the United Nations Covenant on 
        Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and allowing the United Nations 
        Working Group on Arbitrary Detention to visit China, Assistant Secretary 
        of State John Shattuck has testified regarding those reports that ``We 
        do not see major changes [in the human rights siguation in China]. We 
        have not characterized China as having demonstrated major changes in the 
        period over the course of the last year'';
Whereas, in 1990, 1992, and each year since then, the United States has 
        participated in an unsuccessful multilateral effort to gain passage of a 
        United Nations Commission on Human Rights resolution addressing the 
        human rights situation in China;
Whereas the Government of China has mounted a diplomatic campaign each year to 
        defeat the resolution and has succeeded in blocking commission 
        consideration of such a resolution each year except 1995, when the 
        United States engaged in a more aggressive effort to promote the 
        resolution;
Whereas China's opposition to the resolution has featured an attack on the 
        principle of the universality of human rights, which the United States, 
        China, and 169 other governments reaffirmed at the 1993 United Nations 
        World Conference on Human Rights;
Whereas on February 23, 1998, the European Union (EU) agreed that neither the EU 
        nor its member states would table or cosponsor a resolution on the human 
        rights situation in China at the 54th Session of the United Nations 
        Commission on Human Rights;
Whereas on March 13, 1998, the Administration announced that it would not seek 
        passage of a resolution at the United Nations Commission on Human Rights 
        addressing the human rights situation in China;
Whereas without United States leadership there is little possibility of success 
        for that resolution;
Whereas, in 1994, when the President announced his decision to delink Most 
        Favored Nation (MFN) status for China from previously announced human 
        rights conditions, the Administration pledged that the United States 
        would ``step up its efforts, in cooperation with other states, to insist 
        that the United Nations Human Rights Commission pass a resolution 
        dealing with the serious human rights abuses in China'' as part of the 
        Administration's ``new human rights strategy'';
Whereas a failure vigorously to pursue the adoption of such a resolution would 
        constitute an abandonment of an important component of the ``expanded 
        multilateral agenda'' that the Administration promised as part of its 
        ``new human rights strategy'' toward China; and
Whereas Chinese democracy advocate and former political prisoner Wei Jingsheng 
        has stated that ``[t]his [United Nations Commission on Human Rights] 
        resolution is a matter of life and death for democratic reform in 
        China'': Now, therefore, be it
    Resolved, That the House of Representatives--
            (1) urges the President to reconsider his decision not to press for 
        passage of a resolution on human rights violations in China at the 54th 
        Session of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights;
            (2) expresses its profound regret that the European Union will not 
        table or cosponsor a resolution on human rights violations in China at 
        the 54th Session of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights; and
            (3) urges all members of the United Nations Commission on Human 
        Rights to support passage of a resolution on human rights violations in 
        China at the 54th Session of the United Nations Commission on Human 
        Rights.
            Attest:

                                                                          Clerk.