Examination of Witnesses (Questions 20
- 40)
TUESDAY 13 JUNE 2000
MR HUGH
DAVIES, DR
CHRIS HUGHES,
MS KATIE
LEE AND
PROFESSOR MICHAEL
YAHUDA
20. Do you think that the international community—and
let us take the United States and European Union together—are
getting across the message sufficiently that any assault of that
kind on the integrity of Taiwan, as it stands, would really mean
a massive huge breach in international relations; or are we, as
we are on other things like Tiananmen Square, that there is a
bigger game to play inside China and that Taiwan is, in the end,
dispensable?
(Professor Yahuda) I think as the appeal and significance
of communism as an ideology has decayed in China—and, indeed,
there are quite a number of communist institutions which have
decayed—so there has been greater emphasis on what they
call patriotism. This has become one of the few key political
ideas which unites everyone and can enable the leaders to feel
in greater command of public opinion. At the same time, this carries
its own dangers for them because there is a sense in which students
and others tend to get carried away with the nationalist rhetoric
and the demands for toughness on questions of sovereignty and
national grievances. Therefore, the Government is in danger of
appearing to be weak to the outside world in dealing with issues
like Taiwan, for example. One cannot rule out the possibility
that nationalistic passions may reach a point where the leaders
may feel they have been provoked by what might have been said
on the Taiwan side. The calculation might be that if the Chinese
continue to increase their military capabilities, the Americans
may feel more constrained in responding militarily in future scenarios,
so from that point of view I think one cannot rule out the possibility
of use of force, not necessarily in the form of a direct invasion
but in a whole variety of ways. I think it would make a difference
if firm opposition to such actions was seen as something not just
involving America and perhaps Japan. The Chinese leaders would
be further constrained if they knew the use of force would affect
China's relations with the whole of the western world in a very
severe way.
Sir Peter Emery
21. May I ask one simple question. I was surprised
to see that the Minister of State, Mr Caborn, had an official
visit to Taiwan. How did that, or did it, affect our relations
with Jiang Zemin himself? Ms Lee?
(Ms Lee) I am not in a position to comment on that.
(Dr Hughes) I did not notice any big reaction on the
Mainland China side. There has been this very gradual raising
and upgrading of the relationship between the United Kingdom and
Taiwan over the years. That has been acceptable to Beijing within
limits. They see that as necessary for maintaining some sort of
stability. The leadership in Beijing see that they have to be
realistic about Taiwan to a degree as well, in order to prevent
Taiwan moving further towards independence. As Professor Yahuda
was saying, the leadership may want to do all kinds of things,
moderate things, but this is something you will pick up on in
China, the very strong rising tide of nationalism which has really
developed in the 1990s. It was initially encouraged by the leadership
but the leadership more recently have been trying to keep a lid
on it. We saw it, in its most visible form, after the bombing
of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade, when people took to the streets
and we saw the stoning of embassies, including our own. That is
the real problem now for the leadership in Beijing: how to stay
in power and maintain a legitimacy with those kinds of nationalistic
demands being made. So what I am saying is that in the past, perhaps
in the early 1990s, they were able to be a bit more pragmatic
in their approach to Taiwan and accept some kind of upgrading
of relations; but those things are perhaps becoming more difficult
as there is more pressure on the leadership from groups like students,
and particularly from the military, for the People's Liberation
Army, who do not want to see Taiwan moving further away.
22. May I finish one further question. What
you are saying I find is somewhat a contradiction in terms. The
position in Taiwan used to be that we could not have any diplomatic
relationship. All of our contacts were done through trade organisations.
We know the trade organisations were okayed by the Foreign Office
and all this was done to stop any objection by China to our relationship
with Taiwan. It does not seem to me that China has, in any way,
not wished to continue to isolate Taiwan. It has not wished to
bring Taiwan into the community of the world. Yet you say that
a first visit from a British Minister to Taiwan did not seem to
create any worry with the Chinese at all. That is a very definite
alteration, it would seem to me, to what the position used to
be. Is that correct?
(Dr Hughes) Yes. As I said, there has been a steady
attempt by the leadership in Beijing to give Taiwan more international
space, short of it being recognised as a state. That is the real
issue, as to whether or not a major power would recognise Taiwan
as an independent state. Short of that, they have been preparing
steadily, over the last ten years or so, to allow the upgrading
of relations.
23. Mr Davies, you would agree with that?
(Mr Davies) I can speak on the basis of my past experience,
but I stress that you will have to ask the Foreign Secretary these
questions rather than us. The position over many years has been
that there has been a great deal of pressure on the British Government
to allow a degree of expanded contact at a sort of official level
with Taiwan in order to help British commercial interests in Taiwan.
That goes back 15 years or so. That has led to changes from time
to time. First of all, it led to a change in the staffing of the
British office in Taiwan, in the same way that other countries,
such as the United States and others, have staffed their official
offices in Taiwan with diplomats, but with diplomats who were
temporarily retired from being diplomats. We also followed that
route about ten years ago. That is now the situation for our representation
there. Similarly, without going anywhere near moving to sending
senior Cabinet Ministers and so on to Taiwan, there has been a
trickle of Ministers over many years to Taiwan. Mr Caborn, if
he went (I am afraid I was not aware of this) recently, was certainly
not the first. There have been a number of Ministers, over ten
or 15 years, who have visited Taiwan on trade promotion matters—certainly
not on foreign policy, diplomacy matters.
Chairman
24. What we are told is that since 1992 there
have been a number of informal visits by Ministers and that Mr
Caborn's visit should be seen in the same context.
(Mr Davies) That is how I would see it. Again, I speak
without any knowledge of that visit or any responsibility, as
you will understand.
Sir John Stanley
25. This is one really for you, Dr Hughes. It
was reported in the Sunday Telegraph, May 28, by Damien
McKilroy, the paper's Beijing correspondent there, and I quote:
"Hong Kong is refusing to allow the new head of Taiwan's
unofficial mission in the Territory to take up his post until
he gives assurances that he supports reunification with China."
The report went on to say that this was at the personal assistance
of the Hong Kong Chief Executive, Tung Chee-hwa, acting on instructions
from Beijing. I wonder if you could interpret this for us. Do
you regard this as being a significant upping of the antis against
Taiwan, particularly in view of the very key role from a trade
standpoint, and possibly in terms of the intermediary source of
bilateral contact between Taiwan and Beijing, of the Beijing Government
taking this position? Do you see that as something that has happened
in the light of the presidential election in Taiwan? How do you
interpret this bar? I am probably not completely up-to-date as
to whether this bar still continues. Perhaps you would tell us
that.
(Dr Hughes) I do not think it is an upping of the
ante. More of an attempt by Beijing to maintain the available
status quo ante, before the recent presidential elections
in Taiwan: The issue of Taiwan's representation in Hong Kong was
a difficult one with the 1997 transition because there was a possibility
before the transition that Beijing would say that there could
be no representation for Taiwan in Hong Kong. That would have
made things very difficult because, of course, the trade and investment
between Taiwan and Mainland China goes through Hong Kong. It was
favourable for both sides in 1997 for them to reach an informal
agreement that Taiwan would be allowed to maintain its unofficial
representation, kind of cultural office they have there—
(Professor Yahuda) Travel agent.
(Dr Hughes)—which acts as an unofficial consulate,
under condition that they would not be advocating independence
of any sort for Taiwan. Since the presidential election there
has obviously been a change in personnel. The issues now become
far more salient and more of a serious problem for both sides.
Beijing is obviously using this as some sort of leverage to try
and get some sort of extra promise or statement from Taiwan that
they are committed to unification. There is another issue here
concerning Hong Kong, which is very big in Hong Kong at the moment.
That is the issue of advocating Taiwan independence in Hong Kong,
which has become an issue of free speech in the Territory. The
issue was over the new vice president in Taiwan, who is very out
spoken, who was interviewed in Hong Kong and advocated independence.
The head of the broadcasting company was reprimanded for this
by the Hong Kong authorities. Beijing has since said that you
are not allowed to advocate Taiwan independence in Hong Kong.
That obviously is an issue of freedom of speech for Hong Kong.
If I can just throw that in.
Mr Chidgey
26. If I can move on. It is picking up on a
point that Dr Hughes mentioned in passing and also evidence which
has been put to the Committee. I want to start linking relations
between China and the west with human rights and what the witnesses'
views are. In evidence we have received already, it has been put
to us that the British is seen by some in China as: "xenophobic
and narrow-minded." The traditional idea that all foreigners
are red devils, that sort of concept. "One in four Chinese
polled admitted to having an unfavourable view of Britain."
Would you believe that was something which had been promoted by
the Chinese administration? You mentioned in the school books
that they are still taught that the British are imperialists.
Is it something that the administration allows to carry on as
a public perception, this nationalistic approach you talk about;
or is it something they are not aware of? I am going to go on
to the reasons why it is important in a moment. I am going to
ask Professor Yahuda to comment on that in a moment.
(Dr Hughes) Modern Chinese history and Chinese ideas
begin with the Opium War. That is what they are taught. That is
the beginning of their problems. Of course, we played a role in
that. I think more recently I have come across more and more literature,
which as I said earlier, condemns Britain for getting too close
to the United States and being too interventionist. This goes
against the whole grain of Chinese foreign policy which is, of
course, non-intervention. So this is a long-term thing in the
education system: the political culture which goes back to teaching
about the Opium War and the British invasion of China. If you
go to Beijing you can still see the ruins of the Summer Palace,
which was destroyed partly by the British. So they have that image
still there, which is still strong in the education system and
in the arts and so on.
27. Does the Government administration try to
quell that or do they find it useful?
(Dr Hughes) It is useful. The first thing they did
after the Tiananmen massacre was to begin a patriotic education
campaign, which was carried on throughout the 1990s. This sort
of thing, of course, fits into that and is advocated and propagated
really by the Government, by the state.
28. Would you like to comment on this Professor
Yahuda?
(Professor Yahuda) We have to put it in a historical
context, as Dr Hughes mentioned, but we can enlarge the context.
It goes back to the idea of the problems China has in entering
the modern age. Here was a civilisation that saw itself as more
advanced than any other. Suddenly out of the blue it was humiliated
and put down. Clearly the British being the main power in those
days was seen as the main factor in that. Seen from that perspective
Britain may have declined in power terms, but, from a modern Chinese
point of view, it is still tarred (if you like) by that history.
On the one hand, the Chinese embrace of the modern world is conditioned
very much by the idea that they have to try and maintain something
of their own identity in this process.[1]
Today they define it in terms of "socialism with Chinese
characteristics", which they do not define precisely.
Chairman
29. Flexibly.
(Professor Yahuda) Some people would call it capitalism
with Chinese characteristics but anyway— The issue is that
this is a very difficult issue for them in psychological and ideological
terms, as well as in practical terms of adjustment. In that sense,
Britain sometimes figures as something that is helpful to them
but other times it is still the old bogeyman. What we are also
seeing is a Government which used to be very totalitarian and
that now has found it has had to relax many of its controls; so
that you are finding people beginning to have, if you like, independent
opinions. These are shaped by some of these books that Dr Hughes
is talking about.
Mr Chidgey
30. This bring us very neatly on to the key
question of human rights and the relationships between the west
and China. Can you or your colleagues here answer the question
for me. What are China's basic objections to the concerns the
west has about its development of human rights? Are the objections
cultural or are they political?
(Professor Yahuda) They are a mixture of the two.
In my view it is the political which is the key. The Communist
Party, or the Communist Party leadership, is managing a transition
which is extraordinarily difficult for them. Entrance to the WTO
will pose them, sooner or later, with the issue of having to engage
in political reform. I do not see that the Communist Party will
be able to carry on in the way that it is now. That arouses intense
opposition and debate within the party itself. It affects a whole
variety of powerful interests, regional and others. It is within
this context that human rights is seen as a lever that outside
powers use for their own purposes to intervene in China. They
do not see it as a universal norm that is something which we all
share. What some of them would now claim is that in the fullness
of time, once China has reached the same economic standards as
the advanced industrialised countries, then you may find China
being able to practise a kind of democracy that we may be familiar
with. However, in the meanwhile they argue that they have to maintain
stability, because stability is the key to economic development
and to meeting the physical needs of a large, large number of
people. If foreigners keep harping on about this human rights
issue they are encouraging domestic enemies for the Communist
Party, they are interfering.
31. Is it not, in fact, that there is an isolationist
policy in China which fails to recognise that in the West human
rights are a major issue and in particularly this Government we
are talking about the Foreign Office's ethical foreign policy
that is high on the agenda of the Foreign Office? Is it not the
case that if China pursues that then it will make it more and
more difficult to gain the benefits that they wish to gain from
commercial contact, from political contact with the West? Look
what happened in the United Nations in April when this whole issue
of China's position was again voted on and only narrowly was lost.
Do they have any recognition of the impact this has on Western
democracies and their relations with China?
(Professor Yahuda) It depends who you mean by "they".
32. They the Chinese.
(Professor Yahuda) If one talks of the leaders, in
their view I think they have changed quite a lot in the last ten
years over the period where any talk of human rights was totally
out of order as far as they were concerned. Since then they have
signed the two major United Nations' Conventions on Human Rights.
But we should note that they have not ratified them yet. They
have also established what they call a dialogue with a large number
of countries. On human rights questions, as Ms Lee pointed out
earlier. Britain has been quite active in trying to encourage
the expansion of legality and that sort of thing within China.
They are arguing gradually that they are making steps in this
way, they are seeking to enshrine the rule of law in a place which
has not had it for very significant periods in recent times. They
see themselves as a major country and they do not like being put
in the dock all the time. The issue for Britain is a slightly
different one and that is clearly Britain would want to see China
as it emerges more powerfully into the world as a country that
is part of the civilised international community and that conforms
with international norms as we understand them. That is obviously
a long-term project and that is tackled in a whole number of different
ways. When it comes to the immediacy of human rights Western governments
are subject to elections, they have a different sort of rhythm
of time to their periods in office compared, say, to the Chinese
leaders. I think the issues for Western leaders who claim to be
following an ethical foreign policy are what are the standards,
what are the criteria and what can be achieved within a given
period in pursuing a human rights programme with regard to China?
Is it just a question of engaging in some kind of symbolism about
the release of a dissident every now and then when a political
leader happens to visit China? Does that make a real difference
to the way in which human rights are really conducted in China?
Obviously it makes a difference to the individual but I would
argue that of greater import would be to change the right of the
police authorities in China to detain a person without trial for
up to three years. The impact of that on Chinese life, it seems
to me, is much greater than the question of releasing the odd
dissident every now and then. How do you get to such a thing?
The argument is presumably it is a mixture of part dialogue and
partly a degree of robustness but this is a very, very difficult
and delicate matter. If you were to look at the human rights issue
in terms of an historical span I think that conditions for ordinary
Chinese over the last 20 years or so since the reforms have begun
have undoubtedly improved immeasurably. If you were to talk to
Chinese scholars, for example, as I do and some others here, their
capacity now to express independent opinions is far, far greater
than it has ever been.
33. Why do they not talk about the independence
of Taiwan?
(Professor Yahuda) That is regarded as—
34. Right of free speech does not exist yet?
(Professor Yahuda) Not in that sense. If one wants
to identify or discover varieties of opinions within the Chinese
elite which up until about 20 years ago you would not have been
able to identify, today you can do so and you will see them debating
a whole number of different issues in a much more open way than
was the case before. If people lose out in such a debate they
are not knocked down, they are around to survive and to debate
further. It is a measure of progress. Do they have freedom of
speech? No. Do they have freedom of assembly? No. But at the same
time it would be a gross disservice both to them and to us if
we did not recognise that some very real changes have taken place.
35. How long do you think it will take before
they reach the sort of standards of human rights in terms of freedom
of speech and freedom of assembly that we take as a given in the
West?
(Professor Yahuda) In my view there is a huge contradiction
between the way in which the economy has developed with the growth
of the non-state sector with the increasing professionalism of
banking, accountancy, a whole range of things of this sort which
are taking them out of the direct political control of the Communist
Party. In that sense the Communist Party has retreated from the
whole areas of life that it used to dominate before.
36. Is that irreversible?
(Professor Yahuda) Yes. Twenty years ago if you worked
in cities you were bound to your work unit. If you wanted to move
anywhere you had to have a travel permit. If you wanted to get
married you had to have the approval of the party leader in your
work unit. They would determine where your children would be educated.
If you wanted to buy big things you had to have permission and
so on and so forth. Those sorts of things have gone now and they
make an enormous difference in terms of daily life. It is not
enough but it is a significant change. The issue I think is that
the Communist Party system of rule is in contradiction with the
way in which the economy is developing. The WTO entry will increase
that contradiction. How far the Communist Party can continue to
adapt itself, to my mind that is the key issue. If it cannot then
you are going to find a growing explosiveness within China as
social discontent grows as is happening right now. Every day there
are reports of disturbances in the countryside and various cities
and so on because people have become unemployed and there is no
means of giving them appropriate redress, especially when they
find that they have become victims of corrupt practices as well.
It is not just the laws of economics at work, displaced workers
see it as corrupt officials having taken from the public purse
and making their lives much, much more difficult. The Communist
leadership feels that the possibility of a social explosion is
there all the time. In dealing with China we have to recognise
that while we want to press them to move in the directions you
have pointed out, at the same time you have to be aware that this
is a country that could break up under these stresses and strains.
If that were to be the case the consequences for the Chinese neighbourhood,
the Chinese people, in the first instance would be terrific but
the repercussions of that would adversely affect us as well. To
my mind the question of pressing them on human rights is important
but it is one that requires fine judgment.
37. That is very helpful, thank you.
(Ms Lee) You mentioned the cultural and the political
and I think there is another one which is the practical. For a
country that only in 1979 got a Ministry of Justice and for a
whole generation, if not more, of leading officials who knew nothing
of law and who are now running prosecution, courts and the justice
system, there is a practical issue there of education and understanding
what law actually means. I think they would agree with you that
there is a terrific need to strengthen that understanding.
Mr Chidgey: My concern is that we heard earlier
from Dr Hughes that there is still, if you like, propaganda being
taught in schools which are basically nationalist and backward
looking in terms of the history of the last century rather than
forward looking in a fairly based and stable civilisation in society.
Chairman: I would like to call in Sir Peter
on that broad theme.
Sir Peter Emery
38. I was going to urge some answers to the
questions that I wanted to put about the modernisation and codification
of the law in China generally. One of the great difficulties when
I was there was there was the pressure from business houses to
be able to understand exactly what the law meant and how it could
be interpreted and how it varied depending on whether you were
in Shanghai or in Canton or in Beijing. Again, of course, how
is this understood by the Chinese generally as opposed to those
of us who are visiting or doing business with China?
(Ms Lee) I do not operate very much in the commercial
area but if you look at some of the recent laws that have been
passed and drafted, you would not take much issue with their design
on paper. Take criminal procedure law, that allows for the first
time the right of a defence lawyer to go in and represent their
client. There have been some serious advances in how they treat
the criminal process. The problem is the understanding, how do
the judge, the prosecutor, the defence, the police in China actually
understand that? I think there is a big issue of education and
practical training there. Dr Hughes mentioned that the NPC has
begun to exercise a bit of muscle and one of the areas where they
did that was to criticise the Chief Prosecutor's report for the
level of corrupt practices and lack of prosecutions of those.
They would be the first, in our experience, to say they need more
tools, more understanding about how to go about investigating
corruption, prosecuting it. I think there is a willingness there
and a recognition that they have a number of practical problems
in a country the size that it is. You can talk to people in Beijing
and Shanghai who have a lot of contact with Westerners but if
you are expecting the writ of law to work in a small village way
out in the Western Province with somebody who may not have studied
law—
39. And would not be certain they know what
it is. Professor Yahuda, you were going to say something on the
commercial side?
(Professor Yahuda) Yes. China is emerging, if you
like, from a Soviet style system in which there were publicly
known directives and there were directives that would go through
the party channel. One of the difficulties that Western business
people find in dealing with China, especially in the 1980s and
to a certain extent even to this day, is the companies that they
are dealing with on the Chinese side are subject to regulations
that they do not know about. Certainly that aspect, or rather
that practice, is undergoing change, there is much more emphasis
on having proper laws, properly constituted and made properly
public and with the injunction that no other policy regulations
or directives should be allowed to gainsay them. This is occurring
in a bureaucratic climate in which you do not have the respect
for the written laws engrained in that way, there is always the
unofficial party channel. Now we have Jiang Zemin saying that
the Communist Party itself should establish itself in private
businesses. Some people say it is so that they can learn about
business, I suspect that it is part of the traditional Communist
way of seeking to control matters. It will take a long time before
there is such a kind of political culture that you can find the
rule of law as we understand it in the West being respected in
all ways. There is always a degree of arbitrariness about matters.
40. It has not improved?
(Professor Yahuda) There has been some improvement.
Again, I think you have to see this as part of a moving picture.
If you cut it at any significant point you can find all sorts
of points of dissatisfaction but if you compare it to the previous
conditions then you will feel that, yes, there has been progress.
(Mr Davies) Could I just add to that. When I was working
in the Embassy in the 1980s there were only about six commercial
laws on the statute book and since then the situation has changed
radically and dramatically. I think that now there continues to
be, as Professor Yahuda has said, dissatisfaction in some respects,
but the broad commercial body of people working in China are able
to work, generally speaking, within a rule of law situation. With
entry into the WTO later this year it is certainly expected that
the application of commercial laws and transparency of those laws
will definitely have to improve. There will be a monitoring system
set up by the WTO—the Americans have already said that they
will be doing that and I imagine the EU will also be wanting to
do it—to ensure that the laws that are on the statute book
are fairly and transparently applied on the commercial side.
Chairman: Can I thank our panel very much for
that most helpful session and say that if any one of you would
like to add comments we would be very ready to receive further
memoranda. Ms Lee has already sone some work on the legal infrastructure.
Thank you very much indeed.
1 Note by witness: On the other hand, modern
Chinese accept that they must continually absorb new technologies
and engage in massive social change. Back
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