Posted on 12/15/2004 7:23:04 AM PST by hinterlander
Two U.S. congressmen, frustrated by China's coercive abortion practices, are calling for the cancellation of 2008 Olympic games in Beijing unless the communist nation ends its state-sanctioned one-child policy.
Representatives Chris Smith (R.-N.J.) and Tom Tancredo (R.-Colo.) made the demands on China at a congressional hearing called Tuesday to shed light on the case of Mao Hengfeng, who was forced to undergo an abortion and is currently being subjected to torture. Mao's pregnancy 15 years ago violated China's family planning policy, and her protests since then landed her in one of the country's "re-education through labor" camps.
"One of the few things we have available to us right now is this issue of the Olympics," Tancredo said. "We could draw a lot of attention, even if we could get the movement started. Whether it's successful or not, if there was actually a real threat to China, perhaps the world might step away from this because of the ugly kind of press and attention it's getting."
After the House International Relations Committee wrapped up the sometimes-emotional testimony of its witnesses, Smith, the panel's vice chairman, told HUMAN EVENTS he would likely propose a resolution at the beginning of the 109th Congress addressing this situation in China. Smith repeatedly ridiculed Europeans and other members of the United Nations for doing little to demand changes from China.
Tuesday's hearing brought together two assistant secretaries at the State Department who told the committee that China had a long way to go before it corrected the human rights abuses stemming from its one-child policy. Arthur E. Dewey, assistant secretary for population, refugees, and migration, told the committee getting the rest of the world to take China's abuses seriously remains a problem.
"China's birth planning law and policies retain harshly coercive elements in law and practice. Forced abortion and sterilization are egregious violations of human rights, and should be of concern to the global human rights community," Dewey said. "Unfortunately, we have not seen willingness in other parts of the international community to stand with us on these human rights issues."
Smith and Tancredo's solution--tying continued abuses to the 2008 Olympics--would shed light on the problem and might also motivate China where U.S. pressure alone has not.
"Frankly, there really aren't that many things, in the practical sense, that we can do," Tancredo said. "We can express outrage, and we've certainly done it and we'll continue to do it. That will not change the situation in China as we've heard. There is no way this kind of pressure will have the desired effect. We have to have something that really matters."
The troubling situation facing Mao prompted the hearing, even though few members of Congress remain in Washington. The committee's ranking member, Rep. Tom Lantos (D.-Calif.), made a brief appearance to call on China to halt the torture of Mao immediately. Lantos also criticized the fees charged to families who don't comply with the Chinese government's one-child policy. Based on income levels in the United States, he said the fees would amount to $300,000 for a family having a child above the prescribed quota.
Read later.
Tancredo/Rice '08!!
I'm really starting to like this Tancredo guy.
Message to Tancredo: Stick with the Mexican border. That's far more important than China's "one child" policy.
But remember, kids, the United States is the evil empire!
I don't see any of our human rights organizations paying any attention to the way the Chinese government tortures and murders their own people.
In China, women are having their "illegal" children forceably removed from their bodies and killed, then tortured for saying anything. In the United States, people are putting "Merry Christmas" signs in their windows. Which is worse according to human rights and civil liberties activists?
Liberals and internationalists should be ashamed.
NARAL and Planned Parenthood members would be in orgasmic bliss over in Commieland.
The great thing is that China is very hard on Muslims. The MSM will have to pick a side. Commies vs Muslims.
Don't they have to approve funding for the US olympic team? I would guess that they have a lot of influence.
I hear what you're saying, but forcing abortions is wrong.
Uh, no, they don't. The US Olympic Committe isn't financed by the Government at all, unlike most other countries. Congress does have oversight over USOC, and the President can prevent athletes from competing when he's got no clue how else to affect foreign policy (i.e. Jimmy Carter).
In any case, the Distinguished Gentlemen were referring to efforts to deprive China of the 2008 Games, not having the US Boycott the Games. They are as delusional as the "Ohio was Stolen" Wingnuts if they think there is any chance the IOC will take the Games from China over this issue.
If they would just embrace capitalism the problem would solve itself. They are no where near overpopulated.
The entire population of the world could fit in Texas with each person having 2500 sq feet of space. That leaves the rest of the world for food industry etc. We've got lots of room.
The problem is that communism breeds poverty and poverty breeds larger families (because more hands are required to do the work and so many kids die young)
If china just changed to a capitalist country they'd not have to regulate population growth forcibly. Rich people have fewer children. Examine all the first world (mostly capitalist) countries. Most of them have declining birth rates.
Population isn't the problem in China. Communism is
Sheer hubris. These guys are starting to believe their own nonsense.
Sheer hubris. These guys are starting to believe their own nonsense.
I don't get this. Thousands of babies are killed in the U.S. over abortion and these guy want to ban the Olympics in China.
Certainly there is some difference regarding forced abortion and voluntary but doesn't this just make the case abortion is OK as long as the mother wants it?
It is not OK for the baby no matter what the national policy is. The Congressmens efforts seem misplaced.
"They will run out of resources, food, and much more. They are actually being proactive about preventing an ecological disaster of biblical proportions and all I'm hearing is... "Its not right that there citizens can't have a whole bunch of kids.... just like the welfare moms here in the states....""
Having children is a God given right. Education on not having kids when a parent is not ready is a good thing. However a goverment forcing a women to destroy a life is not. That is the entire point of our position in pointing this out to the Chinese. We have enough clout to boycott the Olympics and meaning a worthless, underfunded Bejiing event.
I find your comment on welfare moms highly insulting and no, I am not a welfare mom, I am a man who runs a small business. Their are a couple of women I know who milk the system for welfare, however I know far more who are on it that work part-time, are getting their degree and taking damn good care of their kids which is a full time job in and of itself.
Compare India to China. Same potential of "running out of resources" argument could be made. India is coping by developing technologies to produce greater quantities of food out of limited resources. Your telling the Chinese can't do the same? If China wants to act like a free country, then more actions, not words need to be performed in allowing their citizens to choose what they do with their bodies and responsibilities of children.
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