[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 63 (Thursday, May 19, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: May 19, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                    RENEWAL OF MFN STATUS FOR CHINA

  Mr. MATHEWS. Mr. President, as I join in support of the most-favored-
nation status for the People's Republic of China, I do so with a 
request that we do this on an unconditional basis.
  For a number of years now, we have faced this question. Each year in 
June, we face a crisis point, we reach a decision, and then we start 
the countdown until the next June. I think it is time that we put that 
behind us.
  I support unconditional renewal of MFN because it is the most direct 
and intelligent way to promote American interests and global interests 
in social reform, military stability, and economic growth.
  Mr. President, I start with the premise that we have exhausted the 
effectiveness of MFN status as a tool for advancing human rights in the 
People's Republic. I am sure that risk of losing MFN status has had 
some influence on China's decisions. Yet the annual fracas over MFN has 
not brought the degree of change we seek, nor has it been lasting. In 
fact, some groups contend that human rights have deteriorated in parts 
of China since 1989, when we began using trade status as a lever in 
this issue. My visit to China earlier this year convinced me that the 
annual threat of withholding MFN not has lost its leverage with the 
Chinese, it also places Americans in China in the position of being 
regarded as Yankee bullies.
  The State Department publishes an annual report on human rights 
conditions in all of the world's countries. Some of these countries are 
major trading partners, and the State Department report about them 
makes for very grim reading. Yet despite their poor record of human 
rights conditions, we do not subject them to annual review of MFN 
status. It is time for us to decouple human rights from trade with 
China and to address China's human rights record in a more suitable 
forum.

  The effective way to address human rights is through bilateral and 
multilateral dialogs that summon the influence of regional alliances. 
This is the approach advocated by Australia and other allies in the 
region, and it is much more sensible than clubbing China with threats 
about MFN status. Cooperation always achieves more than isolation and 
confrontation.
  What is more, the United States has no exclusive claim to confront 
China's policies about a range of issues, including human rights. 
China's neighbors have a great stake in democratic ideals, security, 
and trade practices. We should join with them instead of acting like 
the lone sheriff facing down desperados at high noon.
  I submit that programs in human rights will accelerate as China trade 
grows because political change normally follows economic change. The 
surest way to build dissatisfaction with repression is contact with 
people who do not live under it. U.S. investment and people-to-people 
exchanges of technological and government agencies will expand that 
contact. They will expose the Chinese to American work conditions, 
standards of treatment, and human regard that United States policy 
seeks and that the American influence brings. It is absolutely 
incongruous to think that restricting China's access to our influence 
will liberalize China's behavior. When the Chinese people see what they 
have been denied, the repercussions will be far more permanent than 
those we try to impose externally.

  Economic enrichment is far from reaching the majority of China's 1.2 
billion people. Pressures toward massive social upheaval are real and 
increasing. The United States shares a stake in China's economic and 
social stability, and sustained trade is one way to promote our shared 
interest. We see the beginnings of improved human rights as we compare 
social conditions in southern China, where economic progress is 
advancing, to those of northern China, where people live under a more 
rigid regime.
  We have to evaluate each decision about China in the context of 
overall long-term goals in Asia. President Clinton has spoken of his 
vision for a unified Pacific community on many occasions. Adopting a 
maybe-but attitude toward the fastest-growing, most populous country in 
Asia pokes a stick in the eye of his vision. A unified Pacific 
community cannot and will not become fact without a working association 
with China. By definition, no extensive Asian-American bond is possible 
without China's active presence.
  What is more, China can be influential in reducing regional tensions. 
It is in China's interest and the world's interest to decrease the 
chance of North Korean hostility toward South Korea, where thousands of 
United States troops are now stationed. It is also in China's interest 
and everyone's to curtail North Korea's development of nuclear arms. 
The military menace in Asia is a threat to world peace. The Chinese 
have contacts and lines of communication to help defuse that threat.

  Finally, we must consider what will happen to trade itself if we do 
not renew MFN. China already is our seventh largest trading partner. 
The United States and China know the benefits of fostering a greater 
trade relationship. We also know our relationship has been rocky, and 
progress has been jagged in reducing Chinese barriers and making 
China's trade regime more transparent. Much remains to be done if we 
are to resolve these matters. But we have agencies to monitor trade 
activities, and we have recourse other than withholding MFN in reacting 
to them. No progress and no resolution will come if we limit our dialog 
with China and our choice of responses.
  Withdrawing China's MFN would raise tariffs on Chinese imports and 
prices for American consumers. It would provoke retaliation from China, 
including further trade barriers, limits on United States investment, 
and exclusion of United States firms from bidding on public works 
projects. Denying MFN now would rescind what progress our trade 
negotiators have made.
  We also must look at the inconsistencies we are spreading over United 
States policies by recycling this China-MFN issue every year. When we 
are negotiating NAFTA and GATT, we are constantly calling for a level 
playing field. Yet when we talk with China and other nations in the 
region, we teeter-totter all over the place, compounding the level of 
uncertainty.
  That's a frustration echoed by the American businessmen, including 
those in my native Tennessee. Tennessee's economy is a testament to the 
possibilities of foreign trade and foreign investment, especially with 
Asia. In 1992, Tennessee exports to China exceeded $106 million, and 
exports to other Asian nations were tens of millions more. My 
constituents contact me nearly every day about opening and expanding 
Asian trade relationships. They cannot make investment plans on a 
teeter-totter, and they should not have to.
  China is part of the next generation of Asian trade for the United 
States. It also presents one of our greatest occasions to advance 
liberties and standards of living for the huge portion of the Earth's 
people. Those two opportunities are synonymous. To be part of both, the 
United States must accept that we and China are almost totally 
different nations. We have to proceed with recognition of and respect 
for those differences instead of insisting that our view is the only 
view. But the key word is proceed. Different as we are, we can find a 
way to cooperate when we face issues of mutual interest, and we can 
find a way to advance those interests.
  I began my remarks by saying that China has made progress in 
addressing the issues before us, and I want to close on that note. We 
should remember that 20 years ago the People's Republic was steeped in 
its vicious and bloody cultural revolution. The China of today--
Tiananman Square notwithstanding--is different from the China of 20 
years ago. It is different socially and economically--just as the 
United States today differs from who we were before civil rights 
legislation scarcely more than 20 years ago.

  China can be and should be more open and progressive. However, all 
nations young and old constantly remake themselves as the world 
transforms. We and China should continue our dialog with confidence in 
the inevitably of change.
  The crucial point, Mr. President, is that our relationship with China 
must be based on the multitude of interests that involve us. I repeat: 
We cannot center our relationship with China on any single interest. At 
a minimum, our interests, include global economic growth, nuclear 
nonproliferation, regional stability, and environmental cooperation as 
well as human rights. We must consider the advancement of all those 
interests.
  China speaks often of having opened itself to the world, and we speak 
often of opening China to a multitude of influences. Battering only on 
the door of human rights will not open any other doors, and it 
certainly does not to expand American growth through world trade.
  Legitimate disagreements with China remain, and about a host of 
issues. But we gain nothing by adding to the acrimony. Let us match 
criticism with recognition of progress, and let us pursue the 
opportunity of further progress on all fronts before us.
  I thank the Chair. I yield the floor.
  Mr. HELMS. Mr. President, it is indeed appropriate that we pay our 
respects to President Lee of the Republic of China on the fourth 
anniversary of his presidency. It is also appropriate that we commend 
the splendid citizens on Taiwan for the democratic and economic success 
they have worked so hard to achieve, and I happily join Senators 
Murkowski and Simon in doing so.
  Under President Lee's leadership, Taiwan's economy has skyrocketed; 
Taiwan is today an outstanding model of democratic and free market 
economic success and is one of the United States leading trading 
partners.
  All Americans can take pride in having been a partner in Taiwan's 
success. On the occasion of President Lee's fourth anniversary, I 
assure the people of Taiwan that the U.S. Senate surely will always 
stand behind their efforts to fend off the insidious influence of 
communism from across the straits.
  Most importantly on this occasion, it is proper that the record 
reflect the positive actions taken by the Senate Foreign Relations 
Committee and by the U.S. Congress just a few weeks ago when the 
Foreign Relations Authorization Act was passed.
  Once again, the U.S. Congress exhibited its never-failing support for 
President Lee and Free China by including three strong provisions 
specific to Taiwan and Taiwan alone. Unfortunately, but not 
surprisingly, the U.S. State Department and President Clinton appear 
eager to ignore congressional intent in their efforts to appease the 
Communist dictatorship on the mainland. That issue, however, will best 
be addressed in another venue.
  Mr. President, Taiwan has always been a responsible member of the 
international community, willing to take on multilateral political and 
financial burdens to the relief of the American taxpayer and to the 
benefit of world peace and prosperity. I strongly and proudly support 
Taiwan's admission to the United Nations, the GATT, and other 
international organizations and urge the administration to increase its 
support for Taiwan's admission into the arena of international 
organizations.
  Mr. President, in this rapidly changing world, it is encouraging to 
know that the United States continues to have a core group of solid, 
special friends. Without question, the Republic of China is a leader of 
this group.

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