[Congressional Bills 117th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[S. Res. 260 Introduced in Senate (IS)]
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117th CONGRESS
1st Session
S. RES. 260
Remembering the 32nd anniversary of the violent repression of peaceful
protests centered in Beijing's Tiananmen Square and expressing the
sense of the Senate condemning the Government of the People's Republic
of China's ongoing denial of basic rights and fundamental freedoms.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES
June 8, 2021
Mr. Rubio (for himself and Mr. Merkley) submitted the following
resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations
_______________________________________________________________________
RESOLUTION
Remembering the 32nd anniversary of the violent repression of peaceful
protests centered in Beijing's Tiananmen Square and expressing the
sense of the Senate condemning the Government of the People's Republic
of China's ongoing denial of basic rights and fundamental freedoms.
Whereas, during the spring of 1989, an estimated 1,000,000 people engaged in
Tiananmen Square protests and staged similar protests in over 400
Chinese cities, including among many others, students, workers,
academics, journalists and government employees;
Whereas the peaceful demonstrations of 1989 called upon the Government of the
People's Republic of China (``China'') to eliminate corruption,
accelerate economic and political reform, and protect human rights,
particularly the freedoms of expression and assembly, issues that have
become more acute in United States-China relations 32 years later;
Whereas, on June 4, 1989, troops of the People's Liberation Army, at the behest
of Chinese Communist Party leadership, attacked Tiananmen Square to
repress demonstrators, crushing defenseless protestors with tanks and
firing on them indiscriminately, killing hundreds or possibly thousands
of individuals;
Whereas, since June 4, 1989, the Government of China censors any mention of the
Tiananmen Square Massacre, even the date it occurred, and imprisons and
harasses its own citizens who attempt to discuss or peacefully
commemorate Tiananmen Square protests and their violent suppression;
Whereas the Tiananmen Mothers--a group in China composed of parents and family
members of individuals killed on or around June 4, 1989--have annually
called upon the Government of China to reveal the full truth of what
transpired, and some members of this group have passed away without
obtaining justice and accountability for their family members who were
killed in 1989;
Whereas people of mainland China and Macau are again barred this year from
commemorating the lives lost and the legacy of the 1989 massacre, and
the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the
People's Republic of China (``Hong Kong'') is using pandemic
restrictions as a pretext for denying the vigil organizers a permit to
gather;
Whereas the Government of China continues to view the demands of the Tiananmen
protesters, including democracy, transparency, rights protections, and
freedom of speech, as threats to the legitimacy of the Chinese Communist
Party's hold on political power;
Whereas the 32nd anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre is a poignant
milestone, particularly as the autonomy of Hong Kong and freedoms
guaranteed to the people of Hong Kong have been crushed by the
Government of China's imposition of the Law of the People's Republic of
China on Safeguarding National Security in the Hong Kong Special
Administrative Region on June 30, 2020;
Whereas the people of Hong Kong have peacefully commemorated the Tiananmen
massacre each year faithfully in large numbers;
Whereas, starting in 2020, the Hong Kong Police Force has blocked the annual
candlelight vigil to commemorate Tiananmen;
Whereas Hong Kong's autonomy and freedoms have been blatantly denied by the
actions of the Government of Hong Kong and the Government of China,
particularly over the past several years, with disqualifications of
elected members of Hong Kong's Legislative Council, blocking citizens
from running for office, failing to address the petitions of the Hong
Kong people, banning a political party advocating Hong Kong
independence, failing to address excessive use of force by police, and
criminalizing peaceful political activities through the use of spurious
charges of ``subversion,'' ``collusion with a foreign country or with
external elements,'' and ``secession'';
Whereas reforms to Hong Kong's legislative council ended any semblance of
electoral democracy in Hong Kong by requiring the nomination of
candidates by the Election Committee, which previously only elected the
Chief Executive, reducing the number of directly elected seats from 35
to 20, and requires vetting by a screening committee of the
``patriotism'' of any candidate, defined as allegiance to the Government
of Hong Kong and the Government of China and often interpreted as
support for the Chinese Communist Party;
Whereas the political turmoil in Hong Kong is the result of actions of the
Government of Hong Kong and the Government of China, including the
arbitrary arrests and sentencing of peaceful protesters, including well-
known democracy advocates such as Joshua Wong, Martin Lee, Jimmy Lai,
Lee Cheuk Yan, Margaret Ng, Albert Ho, Leung Kwok-hung, Au Nok-hin, Figo
Chan, and others;
Whereas, on May 6, 2021, four Hong Kong pro-democracy activists--Joshua Wong,
Lester Shum, Tiffany Yuen, and Jannelle Leung--were sentenced to lengthy
prison terms for participating in last year's Tiananmen Square vigil;
Whereas the arbitrary arrests of Hong Kong residents for participating in
peaceful rallies and vigils, which is a violation of the rights
guaranteed to the residents of Hong Kong by the International Covenant
on Civil and Political Rights and the Joint Declaration of the
Government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
and the Government of the People's Republic of China on the Question of
Hong Kong, done at Beijing on December 19, 1984 (the ``Sino-British
Declaration''), should be considered by the international community to
be the arbitrary detention of political prisoners for the purposes of
applying sanctions under the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act of
2019 (Public Law 116-76) and the Hong Kong Autonomy Act (Public Law 116-
149);
Whereas China's National People's Congress has imposed national security
legislation with respect to Hong Kong in contravention of the procedures
outlined in the Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region
of the People's Republic of China (the ``Basic Law'');
Whereas that legislation has nullified the independence of Hong Kong's judiciary
and its tradition of rule of law by suspending due process and trial by
jury for cases deemed issues of national security;
Whereas the implementation of that legislation has effectively destroyed Hong
Kong's autonomy in direct violation of the Sino-British Declaration;
Whereas the National Security Law is in direct conflict with the rights
guaranteed to the people of Hong Kong by virtue of the International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Hong Kong is made
subject by way of the Basic Law;
Whereas the United States Department of State, pursuant to the United States-
Hong Kong Policy Act of 1992 (Public Law 102-383) and the Hong Kong
Human Rights and Democracy Act of 2019 (Public Law 116-76), determined
that Hong Kong no longer manifests a ``high degree of autonomy''
distinct from mainland China;
Whereas vague national security laws are used widely in mainland China to
imprison or arbitrarily detain dissidents, rights defenders, civil
society advocates, religious leaders and adherents, former party
members, and persons from ethnic groups whose religious freedom,
linguistic rights, and political expression are heavily restricted by
Chinese authorities;
Whereas human rights, democracy, and religious freedom advocates continue to be
imprisoned, arbitrarily detained, disappeared and held incommunicado in
undisclosed locations, and abducted across international borders under
vague national security laws and other criminal charges in mainland
China, including Gao Zhisheng, Gui Minhai, Xing Wangli, Jiang Tianyong,
Wu Gan, Qin Yongmin, Zhou Shifeng, Yu Wensheng, Wang Yi, and Nobel
laureate Liu Xiaobo, who died in state custody nearly four years ago;
Whereas the Chinese Communist Party and the Government of China used the tools
of state power to silence whistleblowers at the onset of the COVID-19
pandemic, including doctors such as the late Li Wenliang, journalists,
lawyers, scientists, and concerned citizens, and has subsequently
imprisoned some of these individuals, including Zhang Zhan, who was
sentenced to four years in prison on account of her whistleblowing
activity, and Chen Zhaozhi, who has been detained for over a year on
account of COVID-19 related social media posts;
Whereas the United States Congress, particularly in recent years, has passed
numerous measures articulating the longstanding and bipartisan
commitment to human rights in China, including--
(1) the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act (subtitle F of
title XII of Public Law 114-328; 22 U.S.C. 2656 note);
(2) the North Korean Human Rights Reauthorization Act of 2017 (Public
Law 115-198);
(3) the Reciprocal Access to Tibet Act of 2018 (Public Law 115-330);
(4) the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act of 2019 (Public Law
116-76);
(5) the Hong Kong Autonomy Act of 2019 (Public 116-149);
(6) the Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act (Public 116-145); and
(7) the Tibetan Policy and Support Act of 2020 (Public Law 116-260);
Whereas, on this day, we stand in solidarity with Chinese human rights lawyers,
labor and free speech advocates, Christians and other religious groups,
and those distinct ethnic groups who face persecution, such as Tibetans,
who continue to face severe restrictions and a concerted state effort to
erase Tibetan Buddhism, the Tibetan language, and Tibetan traditional
culture;
Whereas, on this day, we condemn the ongoing campaign of genocide and crimes
against humanity committed by the Chinese Communist Party and the
Government of China against Uyghurs as well as other Muslim ethnic
groups who live in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, more than
1,000,000 of whom have been forced into mass internment camps, suffering
a range of human rights abuses including being tortured, sexually
assaulted, forced to renounce their religion and pledge allegiance to
the Government of China, coerced into state-run programs of forced
labor, separated from their families, and forced to undergo abortion and
sterilization procedures; and
Whereas, on this day, we remember the words of the late Nobel Laureate Liu
Xiaobo, who said there is ``no force that can put an end to the human
quest for freedom, and China will in the end become a nation ruled by
law, where human rights reign supreme'': Now, therefore, be it
Resolved, That the Senate--
(1) commemorates the Tiananmen protests and their violent
suppression until such time as citizens of China are able to do
so freely and publicly everywhere across their country;
(2) expresses sympathy to the families of those killed,
tortured, imprisoned, or exiled for their participation in the
pro-democracy demonstrations during the spring of 1989;
(3) calls on the Government of China to allow those
Tiananmen demonstration participants currently living in exile
in the United States and other countries to return to China
without risk of repercussions or retribution to themselves,
their families, or their allies;
(4) condemns the use of violence, torture, harassment, and
arbitrary detention as a means to repress the legitimate
aspirations of the people of China to speak and associate
freely, including to petition the government and challenge the
policies and ideology of the Chinese Communist Party;
(5) calls on the Government of China to release all
prisoners of conscience, including prisoners detained because
of their participation in Tiananmen Square commemorations or
actions calling for the type of political reforms and rights
protections pursued by those who gathered in Tiananmen Square
in 1989 and including over one million Uyghurs and other
predominantly Muslim ethnic minorities in the Xinjiang Uyghur
Autonomous Region;
(6) condemns the forced imposition of national security
legislation with respect to Hong Kong;
(7) calls upon the President to continue to use existing
authorities to hold accountable Hong Kong officials, including
Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam, and Government of China
officials for crushing Hong Kong's autonomy and guaranteed
rights; and
(8) calls upon the President to build an international
coalition to demand that the Government of China adhere to its
international agreements and human rights obligations.
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