Mitt Romney spoke out yesterday about the case of Chen Guangcheng, the blind Chinese dissident who escaped house arrest and is reportedly seeking asylum at the U.S. embassy in Beijing:
“My concern at this moment is for the safety of Chen Guangcheng and his family,” Romney said in a statement released by his campaign on Sunday. “My hope is that U.S. officials will take every measure to ensure that Chen and his family members are protected from further persecution.” …
Weighing in on Sunday, Romney said Chen’s escape “points to the broader issue of human rights in China.”
“Our country must play a strong role in urging reform in China and supporting those fighting for the freedoms we enjoy,” Romney said.
Neither the White House nor President Barack Obama’s re-election campaign has officially weighed in on the issue.
Romney is right to say that the U.S. needs to do more to pressure China on democratic reforms, but it’s probably best for the White House and Obama campaign to say as little as possible about this issue, at least until after Secretary Clinton’s meetings in Beijing this week. As Max wrote yesterday, there is no question as to what the administration should do in this case. For the sake of our principles and national interests, the U.S. has to provide shelter to Chen.
Coming on the heels of the Bo Xilai scandal, Chen’s escape is yet another massive public embarrassment that seems to reveal serious cracks in the Chinese government. Is it really possible that a blind dissident was able to not only escape house arrest, but also travel 500 miles to the U.S. embassy – days before a prescheduled meeting with top U.S. administration officials – without inside help? It certainly doesn’t seem likely. And that will no doubt make for some dicey meetings between U.S. and Chinese officials this week.
Now that we've made the mistake of taking this man in, we have to negotiate a way to get him safely out of the country, as a matter of national prestige. n nIn general, however, human rights in China have little to do with the national interests of the United States, and should not be a major concern. "Human rights" has become an arrow in the quiver of national security hawks who are on the prowl for another enemy. Otherwise we'd be talking about human rights in Saudi Arabia, Israeli occupied territories, Ethiopia and Pakistan. That, however, would be inconvenient.
Not surprising that someone soft on anti-Semitism would view human rights concerns through a narrowly partisan lens in precisely the same way that he is (erroneously) accusing A.G. of doing. But to suggest that no one talks about human rights in the spots that he mentions suggests that the GOM may be going deaf. Doesn't he listen to his brothers and sisters on the Jews for Suicide left? Or is he implying that they're so far gone as to not be worthy of consideration?
Chen appearance in the US embassy is a strike against "capitalistic" communist China. nWhen was the last time that GOM put is foot in the territories? n
Two points. n nFirst, I am not surprised that he could make it 500 miles to the US embassy — my China sources tell me that the country/government is so incredibly corrupt that it is getting to the point of being marginally functional. That things simply aren't getting done because of all the corruption and the rest. n nSecond, it is well established in International Law that an embassy is the sovereign soil of the country whose embassy it is — and he this is on American soil. Thus our principles are not that we will protect him but that we can't not protect him. If we toss him out of our embassy under ChiCom pressure, that would be like tossing someone out of San Franscisco because of ChiCom pressure. n n