Congressman Patrick J. Kennedy (D-RI) today voted against extending
Permanent Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) for China.
Kennedy spoke out against the legislation on the House floor. Some of
his floor remarks are included in the following statement:
"I have opposed extending trade status to China for the past several
years. This is based on numerous human rights, military armament and
weapons proliferation issues which I feel strongly endanger the lives of
Americans here and abroad.
"On nearly every critical international relations issue, we have seen
China take a step backwards. On human rights, China has clearly failed.
More than 1,000 executions of political and other dissenters occurred in
1998.
"On religious rights and freedoms, China has created an atmosphere of
dread where torture and arrests of religious leaders are commonplace.
And on military aggression, China's policies, including weapons sales,
are still of grave concern.
"There is a great amount of pressure to close our eyes to the
practices of the Chinese government. Yet, turning a blind eye only
provides the Chinese government with tacit approval for their abysmal
human rights policies.
"How many more tortures of prisoners are we going to pretend don't
happen? How many more acts of military aggression to Taiwan are we going
to ignore? And how many more religious leaders are we going to allow be
jailed, tortured and even killed before we tell China that we don't
approve?
"By rejecting PNTR, we are not closing the door on China, but simply
maintaining our ability to review trade agreements with the leverage of
an annual process."