By ALEXA OLESEN
(Virtual China News, May 11) Draft legislation proposing a human rights watchdog group be formed to monitor China was made public Wednesday by half of a bipartisan team seeking to smooth the passage of the U.S. trade accord signed with Beijing last November.
The measure, announced Tuesday by Michigan Democratic Representative Sander Levinand Nebraska Republican Representative Doug Bereuter, was released Wednesday by Levin's office. The measure is designed to appease those in Congress who have been reluctant to pass pending legislation granting China permanent normal trade relations status (PNTR) in a vote scheduled for the week of May 22.
"China will enter the World Trade Organization (WTO) with or without support from the United States," said Levin, according to a press release from his office. "This draft companion framework is offered to address Congressional concerns about Chinese compliance with their WTO promises, human rights practices in China, and Taiwan's entry into the WTO."
The draft proposes forming a watchdog group modelled on the Helsinki Commission, the body that monitored the human rights performance of the former Soviet Union. The legislation, if passed, would set in motion the resources to monitor China. Any commission formed to perform the task, however, would likely be limited in its ability to act on any of its discoveries.
An inability to impose sanctions on China would greatly limits the proposed watchdog group's effectiveness. However, issues that opponents of PNTR have raised, such as doubting China's compliance with the terms of the WTO agreement and China's human rights record, would be given more attention by the proposed law.
Fundamentally, the proposal is designed to help sway lawmakers who up to now have been opposed to PNTR for China. The legislation can make a positive vote for PNTR more palatable.
Despite the recent shows of support for granting China PNTR by such prominent figures as Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan and a triumverate of former U.S. Presidents, a Reuters poll Tuesday showed that PNTR is still be 57 votes short of the number needed for passage.
One of the 146 lawmakers (40 Republicans, 104 Democrats, 2 independents) who plan to vote against permanent normal trade relations status for China next week is New Jersey Congressman Robert Menendez. Menendez opposes the bill because of China's human rights record and because of China's poor record in honoring trade agreements in the past.
A spokesman for Menendez was unsure if Levin's proposed parallel legislation would help change the Congressman's mind.
"Congressman Menendez thinks it's an interesting idea, however, the human rights issue is still a major concern and even if a there is a watchdog group to observe them, those [violations] will still take place," said Andrew Kauders, a spokesman for Congressman Menendez.
In any case, should China violate its bilateral trade agreement with the United States, a more effective means of recourse would be to go through the World Trade Organization, a step that would lend the strength of international law to the action and enable the imposition of sanctions.
"There is, in fact, a trade dispute mechanism within the WTO," said Michael Aller, Senior Research Assistant at the Brookings Institution, a foreign policy think tank based in Washington D.C. "We used discriminative trade policies. It allows us to inflict sanctions upon China under WTO rules."
For more information and related links see the Virtual China WTO Focus Page.
