[Congressional Bills 106th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Con. Res. 28 Engrossed in House (EH)]


  1st Session

                            H. CON. RES. 28

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                         CONCURRENT RESOLUTION

  Expressing the sense of the Congress that the United States should 
     introduce and make all efforts necessary to pass a resolution 
criticizing the People's Republic of China for its human rights abuses 
    in China and Tibet at the annual meeting of the United Nations 
                      Commission on Human Rights.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
106th CONGRESS
  1st Session
H. CON. RES. 28

_______________________________________________________________________

                         CONCURRENT RESOLUTION

Whereas the Government of the People's Republic of China has signed two 
        important United Nations human rights treaties, the International 
        Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on 
        Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights;
Whereas the Government of the People's Republic of China recognizes the United 
        Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which calls for the 
        protection of the rights of freedom of association, press, assembly, 
        religion, and other fundamental rights and freedoms;
Whereas the Government of the People's Republic of China demonstrates a pattern 
        of continuous, serious, and widespread violations of internationally 
        recognized human rights standards, including violations of the rights 
        described in the preceding clause and the following:
            (1) restricting nongovernmental political and social organizations;
            (2) cracking down on film directors, computer software developers, 
        artists, and the press, including threats of life prison terms;
            (3) sentencing poet and writer, Ma Zhe, to seven years in prison on 
        charges of subversion for publishing an independent literary journal;
            (4) sentencing three pro-democracy activists, Xu Wenli, Wang Youcai, 
        and Qing Yongmin, to long prison sentences in December 1998 for the 
        announced effort to organize an alternative political party committed to 
        democracy and respect for human rights;
            (5) sentencing Zhang Shanguang to prison for ten years for giving 
        Radio Free Asia information about farmer protests in Hunan province;
            (6) putting on trial businessman Lin Hai for providing e-mail 
        addresses to a pro-democracy Internet magazine based in the United 
        States;
            (7) arresting, harassing, and torturing members of the religious 
        community who worship outside of official Chinese churches;
            (8) refusing the United Nations High Commissioner on Human Rights 
        access to the Panchen Lama, Gendun Choekyi Nyima;
            (9) continuing to engage in coercive family planning practices, 
        including forced abortion and forced sterilization; and
            (10) operating a system of prisons and other detention centers in 
        which gross human rights violations, including torture, slave labor, and 
        the commercial harvesting of human organs from executed prisoners, 
        continue to occur;
Whereas repression in Tibet has increased steadily, resulting in heightened 
        control on religious activity, a denunciation campaign against the Dalai 
        Lama unprecedented since the Cultural Revolution, an increase in 
        political arrests, the secret trial and sentencing of former Middlebury 
        College Fulbright Scholar and Tibetan ethnomusicologist Ngawang Choephel 
        to 18 years in prison on espionage charges, and suppression of peaceful 
        protests, and the Government of the People's Republic of China refuses 
        direct dialogue with the Dalai Lama or his representatives on a 
        negotiated solution for Tibet;
Whereas the annual meeting of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights in 
        Geneva, Switzerland, provides a forum for discussing human rights and 
        expressing international support for improved human rights performance;
Whereas during his July 1998 visit to the People's Republic of China, President 
        Clinton correctly affirmed the necessity of addressing human rights in 
        United States-China relations; and
Whereas the United States did not sponsor a resolution on China's human rights 
        record at the 1998 session of the United Nations Commission on Human 
        Rights: Now, therefore, be it
    Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), 
That it is the sense of the Congress that the United States--
            (1) should introduce and make all efforts necessary to pass 
        a resolution criticizing the People's Republic of China for its 
        human rights abuses in China and Tibet at the annual meeting of 
        the United Nations Commission on Human Rights; and
            (2) should immediately contact other governments to urge 
        them to cosponsor and support such a resolution.

            Passed the House of Representatives March 11, 1999.

            Attest:

                                                                 Clerk.