Examination of Witnesses (Questions 60
- 79)
TUESDAY 13 JUNE 2000
MR JAMES
HARDING, MR
GRAHAM HUTCHINGS
AND MS
LORNA BALL
Sir Peter Emery
60. Can I just ask you about jamming. Does the
government make any objections to the Chinese government about
the jamming of the BBC's transmissions?
(Ms Ball) It is an issue that has been raised, yes.
61. But without any success?
(Ms Ball) As far as we are concerned with no success.
62. I find what you have said rather depressing,
that it has been raised. It is not something that is continually
being pushed at the Chinese government, is it?
(Ms Ball) The Chinese government does not accept that
it does jam the BBC or, indeed, other international broadcasters'
radio signals.
63. That is fine, but you can say black is not
black and you therefore have to begin by trying to prove to people
that they are wrong. It seems to me that there does not appear
to be a continuing pressure from the government to try to deal
with this problem. Is that a fair or unfair statement to make?
(Ms Ball) I think it is perhaps slightly unfair. The
BBC also has ways of raising this as an issue through the organisation
that we deal with that provides us with our shortwave radio transmitters
and signals into China. They belong to an international organisation
which all countries have representatives attending and they have
raised that at an international level with their Chinese colleagues
on our behalf. I think it is also a question of how effective
we think the government continually raising such an issue would
actually be.
64. It would not embarrass you if we raise this
when we are in China ourselves?
(Ms Ball) I do not think it would embarrass us.
Sir David Madel
65. What do you think the Chinese leader said
to the North Korean leader when he visited Beijing? Do you think
he will take any notice? I would like all three of you to answer,
please.
(Ms Ball) I think it would be a brave person who would
say that what they said to North Korea is going to be taken very
careful heed of. I know that when America was trying to do a deal
with North Korea over the provision of power so that the North
Koreans would stop using the nuclear sources, there was a fear
that it would actually turn into a nuclear missile capability
in North Korea, it was hoped that China would put pressure on
North Korea to agree to this arrangement. I think the Chinese
found it in some ways quite difficult to put that pressure on
North Korea as well.
(Mr Harding) The answer to the first part is I do
not know. That is one of the difficulties with this relationship,
that whatever is said between Beijing and Pyongyang very few people
know the real nature of that relationship. Beijing is perceived
to have the best relationship of any foreign government with Pyongyang
and that is not saying very much because the amount of influence
that Lorna mentioned that they have over Kim Jong-il is pretty
limited and actually his primary concerns are his relationships
with his army and his capacity to maintain control in North Korea.
(Mr Hutchings) This is one of the many occasions on
which I would have left my tape recorder on inadvertently in the
Great Wall of the People and I would have been happily able to
tell you what they said to each other. Rather than speculate on
that, I think one has to consider the relationship. What are China's
interests here with the Korean Peninsula and how can the present
leader there satisfy them? I suppose what China fears most—
66. Is a war?
(Mr Hutchings) Is the arrival in any form of American
influence along the border with China. That would mean unification
on South Korean terms would be deeply unsatisfactory to Beijing.
It does not want to see that. It does not want to see a war either,
as you say. There must be some change in status quo. An impetus
for that is coming from Pyongyang, to say nothing of Seoul. Beijing
would like to monitor that very carefully and to ensure that there
is not a substantial realignment of military forces on the Korean
Peninsula.
67. Is there any evidence to suggest that China
is helping other countries to build nuclear warheads and delivery
systems? How involved is China in North Korea's nuclear programme?
(Mr Hutchings) The answer to the first question is
yes. I think they have also aided North Korea in the past although
I believe with the signing of the 1994 agreement their record
is very much better. There have been nuclear programmes in Pakistan.
There have been nuclear programmes to the Middle East and even
to North Africa in the past.
Dr Starkey
68. Where in the Middle East?
(Mr Harding) Iran.
Sir David Madel
69. If Korea was unified in some way, would
Beijing find acceptable a clear American assurance that with reunification
no American troops will be stationed north of the 38th Parallel?
Would that do as a calming influence?
(Mr Hutchings) I think the kind of scenario they would
be looking for is that if the Peninsula were reunified there would
be no need for American troops at all.
(Mr Harding) One issue that is likely to come up in
your visit related to this is the future of TND and the US military
strategic interests in that area. We talked in terms of North
Korea but, of course, this is highly relevant in terms of how
the US plans to act vis a vis Taiwan and China. To a certain
extent the deployment of troops on the Korean Peninsula has become
a secondary issue in terms of concerns about TND.
Mr Rowlands
70. I wonder if I could just ask our three witnesses.
We wrote a recent report on UK-Russian relations, and I hope I
do not do an injustice to the report, the core recommendations
were roughly enhanced regional consulates where possible, beef
up the British Council and World Service, have constructive engagement
in human rights and enhanced trade and commercial staff to match
our European partners. Are there any more exciting or interesting
ideas on UK-Chinese relations than those we produced on Russia?
(Mr Harding) Not to sound too flattering, those ideas
if you really pushed them through in the Foreign Office are pretty
exciting in terms of UK-Chinese relations.
71. Those core recommendations?
(Mr Harding) Those core recommendations. Let us take
the most contentious one, the human rights one. If there really
was powerful advocacy by the British Foreign Office and the embassy
and it translated the idea of ethical foreign policy into a clear
programme that would be a very exciting project. I agree with
the comments Professor Yahuda made about the legal requirements
in terms of police detentions but there are also issues about
raising specific names and the cases of people in the China Democracy
Party who were imprisoned at the end of 1998, the issue of Tibet,
how the British Foreign office communicates British opinion on
this issue regularly and consistently to its counterparts in China
is very important. I suppose the one issue that I would add to
your list of four is cultural and educational and do we feel that
in the UK there is the kind of exploitation of our strengths as
an educational and cultural centre that our counterparts in America
are doing. By that I do not mean just transfers of the National
Theatre and Royal Opera House productions but given that the greatest
common language that possibly the UK and China share is football,
how much are we doing about that?
Dr Starkey
72. What can they teach us?
(Mr Harding) That is true.
(Ms Ball) Manchester United's largest fan club in
the world is in China.
(Mr Harding) Things like football, things like Mr
Bean are not
perhaps—It depends on your point of view,
I am not going to get into British cultural exports. The issue
really is to say how much are we going to promote those sorts
of exports in China. We are beginning to do a little. Conversely,
how much are we doing to get really large numbers of Chinese students
studying in the UK because the appetite for UK study is huge.
(Mr Hutchings) Those things you mentioned are all
extremely worthy and could be usefully enhanced everywhere. I
agree very much with the previous speaker about the case concerning
China. The message is there, I think, to strengthen what we could
call broadly unofficial ties of various kinds, people to people
ties, to allow a thickening of relations between the United Kingdom
and China. I would add one other general point and one specific
point, both equally important. The consequence of this broadening,
this thickening, is that it becomes a category as far as the Foreign
Office is concerned in its dealing with China, that despite various
interests in common, important interests such as commerce, weapons
proliferation, environmental protection, there cannot really be
happy and satisfactory relations between the UK and China given
the way the Chinese government treats many of its people. That
is a given. The specific issue which I said was equally important
concerns an addition to those you mentioned, it concerns Taiwan.
The case for extending diplomatic recognition to Beijing and denying
it to Taipei is, I think, an unfortunate one but a necessary one.
It does not follow from that that Britain cannot affirm what has
happened in Taiwan, which is a very extraordinary thing, the move
inside ten years towards genuine democracy conducted in a peaceful
environment. That should matter, that is in British interests,
that is something about which the British Government and the British
people can identify. In its relationship with Beijing it should
be made clear that Britain would regard that as a fundamental
set-up in its relations with China broadly conceived were democracy
to be threatened, undermined in any way, by Chinese belligerence.
73. Thank you very much. You have underlined
or underscored the rather healthy scepticism that exists in your
submission to us. I want to ask the other two witnesses how much
they agree with your assessment. Mr Hutchings says, for example,
"The myth of the `world's largest market for foreign goods',
fostered sedulously by successive Chinese governments, and believed
by successive generations of foreign business personnel, must
be acknowledged as a myth." He then goes on to say why should
we not receive a Taiwanese government democratically elected President
in the United Kingdom instead of ignoring them. Do the other two
witnesses agree with the pitch that Mr Hutchings has been making
in his memorandum and in most of his remarks this morning?
(Mr Harding) Yes, I agree. Firstly, I would like to
say I agree fundamentally with the point about democratic transition
in Taiwan and that our concerns about how any commentary would
be interpreted in Beijing means that probably in the past we have
been mealy mouthed about the very considerable achievement of
democracy and de facto independence in Taiwan. The myth
of the billion person market, absolutely. This picks up the question
Dr Starkey asked about the internet. We must realise that at the
end of last year there were two million users and this year there
are five million, next year it will be moving towards ten million
users, so a fraction of the country when you think about the market.
If you go and speak to the likes of Unilever or P&G they are
really only talking about a market of 150 million people. This
is for shampoos, soaps and toothpaste. In the sense that this
is a billion person market, yes, it will be but not for a generation
at the earliest. The extent to which policy is made and the policy
makers are deferential towards Beijing, on the basis of that it
is very dangerous and potentially damaging to Taiwan.
74. Do all of you agree with that assessment?
(Ms Ball) Yes, I do. I think the myth of the 1.2 or
the 1.3 billion market is indeed largely a myth. If you ask any
of the Western companies just how much profit they are making
from China I think you would be surprised at some of the answers.
Although they do regard it as an important market, it is much
smaller than we commonly think of. It is very competitive. I have
alluded to the competitive media but it is very competitive in
all of its products, not least because China is still a developing
and sometimes quite a poor country that varies from place to place.
People do not have the disposable income to spend on huge amounts
of consumer goodies, although I am sure in time maybe that will
come.
Mr Rowlands: One final question, if I may. I
have been reading this book, The Era of Jiang Zemin, it
is dense, extremely detailed and I am sure it is invaluable.
Dr Starkey: But boring.
Mr Rowlands
75. When I get through it. I am getting the
impression from this book that he represents a bit of a throw
back and this is not real progress and that the reforms and the
changes, political reforms, are putting the brake on reforms,
restoring more and more the Communist Party back into the centre
of things even if it was only just marginally pushed out. May
I ask the political commentators what their assessment of the
present leadership in China is?
(Mr Hutchings) When Jiang Zemin was first appointed
one of his earliest remarks, perhaps little noticed at the time,
was to refer to his predecessor, and he said that Zhao Ziyang
made political mistakes but it is something he would not do. He
was referring specifically to what the Communist Party calls bourgeois
liberalisation, those things that we recognise as the beginnings
of individual freedom, of pluralism and democracy. What he has
done, rather remarkably, again with little notice because of his
somewhat dour although occasionally clownish public image, is
to preside over continued economic growth and yet to have preserved
the party state as still a formidable organisation, not as powerful
as it was ten years ago, and, if things continue as they are,
not as powerful in ten years time as it is now. He has essentially
preserved the authority of the party state, its ability to cope
with most major organised crises and threats to the Communist
Party system. The question now at issue amongst those of us who
derive pleasure from earning a living out of following Chinese
politics is what he will do when the Party Congress meets in 2002.
There are some indications that he will indeed formally retire,
by which time he will be in his mid-70s, and a successor, Mr Hu
Jintao, has been lined up to take over. There are strong indications
that he will follow in the footsteps of his own mentor, Deng Xiaoping,
and formally retire but retain a powerful behind the scenes influence.
This will disappoint you but I think the era of Jiang Zemin is
going to last for quite a while.
76. I should persevere with the book obviously.
(Mr Harding) I hope Jiang Zemin retires before you
finish the book. I agree with what Graham was saying. I just ask
the question what is Jiang Zemin's mission? If Mao Tse-tung was
the man who, using the Chinese term for this, helped the Chinese
people stand up and Deng Xiaoping was the man who set China on
the path of prosperity, what is Jiang Zemin going to do? This
seems to me to be the question that he is still struggling to
answer. While he has maintained party control, as Graham mentioned,
all he has been is a pragmatist. He comes from the wind faction,
he blows with the wind. He has managed the difficulties of political
life in Beijing very deftly and survived far longer than many
people expected. Ultimately there is a question about what is
his legacy going to be. Again, we return to Taiwan because the
concern with Taiwan following the return of Hong Kong was having
presided over the return of Hong Kong he immediately raised expectations
that Taiwan would follow and return to the motherland quickly
and that is going to be very difficult. Having raised those expectations
how does he now deliver them?
(Ms Ball) I think Jiang Zemin's position in this is
crucial because no Chinese leader will want to go down in history
as the person who lost Taiwan because Taiwan is a crown jewel:
Macao, Taiwan and Hong Kong. I think whatever Jiang Zemin's legacy
it will be tied up with the position over Taiwan. I think also
the economic progress in China which we have focused on but also
the huge social dislocation. One of Jiang Zemin's biggest accomplishments
in that is his continuing line of maintaining the Communist Party
in as much power as it still wields but the contradiction that
Professor Yahuda spoke about before is acute in China, social
dislocation. At the heart of China there is an ideological vacuum,
whether it is a political vacuum, a vacuum of spirituality, there
is something that is missing which is quite hard to put your finger
on, but I think the recent rapid growth and arrests of the leader
of the spiritual leader of Falun Gong is one indicator of that.
I think that is part of Jiang Zemin's legacy as well. The Communist
Party remains in power, economic development has continued but
the social dislocation is enormous. The question of why is the
Communist Party in power if it is not Communism that people are
turning to, if it is some form of capitalism that attaches to
the Communist Party, and whether that actually means ideologically
the Communist Party, on what basis is it still in power?
Mr Chidgey
77. I would like to put this concept to all
three of our witnesses. You heard Professor Yahuda this morning
making a comment that there had been significant if not great
progress on human rights in China in the last 20 years and yet
we have evidence from the Government in their submission and they
say: "the human rights situation in China remains a matter
of serious concern to HMG. Over the last two years there has been
a marked deterioration in the respect of key civil and political
rights including the freedoms of expression, assembly, association,
conscience and religion". The first question is who is right?
The most important thing about that, because we could go on all
day, is if that has been developing in these key human rights
aspects in China to whatever degree, how much of that is due to
the evolution of China's society, politically and civil, and how
much is it due to the pressure politically and economically that
has been exerted by the West? Perhaps, Mr Harding, you would like
to start on that?
(Mr Harding) I think that on the specific issue about
over the last two years, HMG is right.
78. So again we are going backwards?
(Mr Harding) I think they have back pedalled over
the last two years particularly if you look at the case of the
China Democracy Party, which was established in the second half
of 1998 and was never in any way a credible threat to the Communist
Party in China but Jiang Zemin went out of his way to round up
the 13 leaders. This was after Bill Clinton had been, after Wang
Dan had been released, after they had got good publicity about
improvements in human rights, there was then the clamp down on
the China Democracy Party. This is a point of considerable concern
given the length of the prison sentences that were meted out to
the 13 leaders in the China Democracy Party. Falun Gong as well
has been a remarkable illustration both of the anxieties of the
Chinese leadership but also its willingness to use force to suppress
anything that resembles a gathering of Chinese people that is
not organised by the authority. Yes, there is a roll back. The
second question is very difficult. Fundamentally China will change
itself, it will not be changed.
79. Thank you. It brings in the question of
whether this whole business of huge economic opportunity both
ways is indeed a myth in terms of a change in China?
(Mr Harding) China will change itself. One of the
great changes of the last generation has been opening up to the
rest of the world and in that process in the exchange of opinions,
people and relationships of course attitudes change. I suppose
what I am saying when I say that China will change itself is not
that foreign governments can lay down the rules, of course they
cannot, but what they can do is set standards. I think to leave
China to go its own course is as irresponsible as it is to assume
that you can tell China what to do.
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