[Congressional Bills 105th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[S. Res. 242 Introduced in Senate (IS)]







105th CONGRESS
  2d Session
S. RES. 242

Expressing the sense of the Senate that the President should not go to 
China until certain aspects of United States policy toward China in the 
areas of national security, trade, and human rights have been clarified 
   and outstanding questions surrounding the export of United States 
          satellite and missile technology have been answered.


_______________________________________________________________________


                   IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

                 June 4 (legislative day, June 2), 1998

 Mr. Ashcroft (for himself and Mr. Hutchinson) submitted the following 
  resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations

_______________________________________________________________________

                               RESOLUTION


 
Expressing the sense of the Senate that the President should not go to 
China until certain aspects of United States policy toward China in the 
areas of national security, trade, and human rights have been clarified 
   and outstanding questions surrounding the export of United States 
          satellite and missile technology have been answered.

Whereas the President has pledged that the United States ``must remain a 
        champion'' of the liberties of the Chinese people;
Whereas two of the most notable Chinese dissidents, Wang Dan and Wei Jingsheng, 
        effectively have been exiled from their country;
Whereas thousands of other individuals remain imprisoned in China and Tibet for 
        peacefully expressing their beliefs and exercising their inalienable 
        rights, including freedom of association, freedom of speech, and freedom 
        of conscience;
Whereas the Government of the People's Republic of China routinely, 
        systematically, and massively continues to commit widespread human 
        rights abuses in Tibet, including instances of death in detention, 
        torture, arbitrary arrest, imprisonment for the peaceful expression of 
        religious and political views, and intensified controls on the freedom 
        of speech and the press, particularly for ethnic Tibetans;
Whereas China has taken extraordinary steps to avoid the condemnation of the 
        United Nations Commission on Human Rights;
Whereas the President has failed to press China aggressively to protect the 
        civil liberties of the Chinese people and failed even to sponsor a 
        resolution at the meeting of the United Nations Commission on Human 
        Rights condemning China's human rights violations, which include forced 
        abortion, summary execution, arbitrary imprisonment, and persecution of 
        religious minorities;
Whereas since November 1994, the President has declared annually a national 
        emergency regarding the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and 
        stated that such proliferation poses ``an unusual and extraordinary 
        threat to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the 
        United States'';
Whereas, in a June 1997 report on proliferation activity, the Central 
        Intelligence Agency identified China as ``the most significant supplier 
        of weapons of mass destruction-related goods and technology'', including 
        missile, nuclear, and chemical weapons technology to rogue states such 
        as Iran;
Whereas United States satellite cooperation with China has benefited China's 
        intercontinental ballistic missile program--missiles with nuclear 
        warheads pointed at the United States, and the Department of Justice is 
        investigating possible missile technology transfers to China resulting 
        from United States-Chinese satellite cooperation;
Whereas the President's decision to waive restrictions on the export to China of 
        missile technology similar to that under investigation by the Department 
        of Justice, and the President's efforts to lift the requirements for 
        launch waivers altogether, undermine the present Justice Department 
        investigation and threatens United States national security;
Whereas the Department of Justice is investigating possible campaign 
        contributions from the People's Liberation Army to the Democratic 
        National Committee through contributions from an executive at China 
        Aerospace International Holdings, an affiliate of China Aerospace 
        Corporation, the firm which oversees China's missile development and 
        space programs;
Whereas China made written commitments to the United States during the October 
        1997 summit to terminate nuclear cooperation with Iran and was later 
        reported to be violating that pledge by attempting to provide Iran with 
        hundreds of tons of anhydrous hydrogen fluoride, a material for use in 
        Iran's nuclear weapons complex to enrich uranium to weapons grade;
Whereas the President, in allowing nuclear cooperation to proceed with China, 
        certified that ``the People's Republic of China has provided clear and 
        unequivocal assurances to the United States that it is not assisting and 
        will not assist any nonnuclear-weapon state, either directly or 
        indirectly, in acquiring nuclear explosive devices or the material and 
        components for such devices'';
Whereas the credibility of this certification is undermined by China's 
        continuing proliferation activity, including efforts to assist Iran's 
        nuclear weapons program;
Whereas since the United States normalized trade relations with China in 1979, 
        China has risen from the 57th to 4th largest supplier of United States 
        imports;
Whereas China's trade and investment practices have resulted in a 1997 trade 
        deficit of $49,700,000,000, an imbalance more than 2.5 times larger than 
        the United States trade deficit with all European countries, and 
        accounting for one-fourth of the United States trade deficit with the 
        entire world;
Whereas in the Executive branch's 1997 National Trade Estimate on Foreign Trade 
        Barriers, China's trade regime was identified as ``political'', 
        ``severely restricted'', ``prohibitive'', ``unpredictable'', 
        ``preferential'', ``de facto'', ``unpublished'', ``vague'', 
        ``inaccessible'', ``inconsistent'', and ``noncompetitive'';
Whereas facing Congress's near withdrawal of most-favored nation (MFN) status in 
        1991 and President Bush's threat of sanctions, China, in order to keep 
        MFN status and have the United States support its accession to the World 
        Trade Organization (WTO), agreed that it would allow the United States 
        automobile sector to compete freely in the Chinese market and that, by 
        December 31, 1997, it would eliminate significant trade barriers to 
United States agricultural exports;
Whereas China's trade liberalization commitments in 1991 have not been honored, 
        yet the Executive branch is moving forward in negotiations for China to 
        accede to the WTO;
Whereas concessions made by China in negotiations to accede to the WTO have been 
        piecemeal, inconsistent, and deficient, and thus limit the economic 
        opportunity of United States businesses and workers;
Whereas Taiwan serves as an example of democratic governance to China and the 
        authoritarian Chinese communist party;
Whereas the People's Republic of China carried out missile exercises in 1995 and 
        1996 intended to intimidate the people of Taiwan, continues a military 
        buildup directed at the island, refuses to renounce the use of force 
        against Taiwan, and consistently seeks to isolate Taipei from membership 
        in international organizations and general relations with other 
        countries;
Whereas the Chinese communist party has undermined the institutions of 
        democratic government in Hong Kong by abolishing Hong Kong's elected 
        legislature, designing a framework for legislative elections that 
        severely limits representative democracy, and passing retroactive 
        legislation exempting Chinese entities from a host of Hong Kong's laws; 
        and
Whereas the Democratic Party of Hong Kong won every seat elected by direct 
        ballot in Hong Kong, garnering over 60 percent of the popular vote, yet 
        President Clinton has declined to meet individually with the leadership 
        of the Democratic Party of Hong Kong: Now, therefore, be it
    Resolved, That, in the interest of improving United States-China 
relations, it is the sense of the Senate that--
            (1) a healthy and stable relationship with China is in the 
        national interests of the United States;
            (2) the Chinese people should be allowed to freely exercise 
        their unalienable rights, including the rights to freedom of 
        speech, of religion, and of association;
            (3) efforts by the Chinese government to restrict those 
        liberties pose a threat to a stable China and a positive long-
        term relationship with the United States;
            (4) the President should submit a report to Congress as 
        soon as possible after the proposed summit in China concerning 
        his progress in securing the release of persons remaining 
        imprisoned in China and Tibet and other significant steps to 
        improve human rights;
            (5) China's proliferation of weapons of mass destruction 
        technology poses an unusual threat to the national security of 
        the United States;
            (6) the President has failed to confront China's 
        proliferation of weapons of mass destruction technology, 
        proliferation that is directly responsible for contributing to 
        an escalating nuclear arms race between India and Pakistan;
            (7) the trustworthiness of the Chinese government is 
        undermined when nonproliferation and trade commitments of 
        Chinese officials are repeatedly broken;
            (8) the President, in addition to applauding narrow trade 
        concessions from China, should ensure that the highest levels 
        of diplomacy are used to open the entire Chinese market to 
        United States trade and investment;
            (9) China's accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO) 
        should be conditioned on China's compliance with past market 
        access commitments and further steps to open China's market to 
        United States investment and trade in goods and services;
            (10) the United States should not jeopardize cooperation 
        with and assistance to the democratic government of Taiwan to 
        appease the Chinese government but instead should maintain 
        unambiguously its legal commitments to help maintain Taiwan's 
        capacity for self-defense while calling upon the Chinese 
        government to renounce the use of force against the people of 
        Taiwan;
            (11) the preservation of democratic government and rule of 
        law in Hong Kong is an obligation of the Chinese government and 
        failure to honor that obligation will have a negative effect on 
        United States policy toward China;
            (12) China is resisting the spread of democracy in Asia, 
        which is occurring from South Korea to Indonesia, and the 
        failure of President Clinton to meet with the leaders of the 
        Democratic Party of Hong Kong undermines his statement to 
        President Jiang that China's repressive government is ``on the 
        wrong side of history''; and
            (13) the President should not go to China to attend a 
        summit with President Jiang until--
                    (A) the President has provided a full disclosure to 
                Congress concerning the transfer of United States 
                satellite and missile technology to China; and
                    (B) United States policy toward China in general 
                has been formulated more effectively to protect United 
                States national security, economic, and human rights 
                interests.
    Sec. 2. The Secretary of the Senate shall transmit a copy of this 
resolution to the President.
                                 <all>