Countdown to U.S.-China talks

China's repeated sabre rattling toward Taiwan has raised concerns in Bush's Republican administration

BEIJING, China -- Chinese Vice Premier Qian Qichen has left Beijing for Washington where he will hold talks with U.S. President George W. Bush focusing on such thorny issues as human rights and U.S. arms sales to Taiwan.

ALSO Taiwan arms sales to top U.S.-China agenda

Qian's week-long trip will seek to temper any decision the U.S. will make next week on a planned resolution against China's human rights violations before the United Nations in Geneva.

The highest level meeting between American and Chinese officials since 1998 will also touch on possible arms sales by the U.S. to Taiwan, to be decided in April.

Qian is also expected to discuss U.S. plans to develop a nuclear missile defense shield which Beijing says would hamper global arms control efforts and trigger a new arms race.

Human rights record

China has been widely criticized for its method of dispersing protesters belonging to the Falun Gong sect.

China's treatement of the outlawed Falun Gong spiritual movement has also raised concerns

The protesters are being detained under a "re-education through labor" program, and human rights groups say they have been denied a fair trial.

During a visit to China last month, UN High Commissioner Mary Robinson noted that the country's labor system was "contrary to international human rights standards."

Last week, an explosion inside a school in Jiangxi province, east of China, brought into focus the widely tolerated practice of child labor in schools.

More than 30 grade school students, tasked to make fireworks to augment the school's budget, were killed.

Beijing initially blamed a crazed bomber for the tragedy but has since admitted that the school was involved in the manufacture of fireworks although it is unclear whether they now accept local claims that this was what caused the blast.

Arms sales

The administration of President George W. Bush, which brought the Republicans back to power in January, has not challenged Beijing's stand that Taiwan is a renegade province of China.

But U.S. officials claim China's missile build-up, some 50 to 300 more each year and aimed at Taiwan, would eventually pose a serious threat to the island's defense capability and shake regional security.

China recently raised its defense budget by $17 billion, the highest in 12 years.

Last Friday, the U.S. reported that China has completed a second medium-range missile base close to Taiwan, justifying its planned arms sales to Taiwan.

The U.S. will decide in April on which arms it would sell Taiwan, an annual practice under the provisions of the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act.

Topping Taiwan's wish list are four of the Navy's most advanced warships, $1-billion destroyers equipped with high-tech Aegis radar.

Taiwan also wants four Kidd-class destroyers, P-3 submarine-hunting aircraft and high-speed anti-radiation missiles.

China has repeatedly warned Taiwan, which it regards as a 'renegade province, against declaring independence.

Frayed ties

Chinese Foreign Minister Tang Jiaxuan has urged the United States to "rein in its wild horse" behavior on Taiwan.

But China watchers do not expect any basic policy shifts from previous U.S. administrations.

"It strikes me that we're potentially in an action-reaction cycle, where in China there's a huge misunderstanding of American foreign policy," said Rep. James Leach, a senior member of the House International Relations Committee.

"I think a pattern of increasing openness, increasing engagement, has been the norm," said Michael O'Hanlon, an analyst at the Brookings Institution.

Although all U.S. presidents have engaged China since Nixon reopened relations in 1972, a change of emphasis occurred with the end of the Cold War and China's crackdown on Tiananmen Square demonstrators.

Even as former President Bill Clinton pursued a relationship with Chinese President Jiang Zemin, he warned his Beijing counterpart that his communist regime was "on the wrong side of history."

The accidental U.S. bombing of the Chinese embassy in Yugoslavia in 1999 further frayed ties.

Not an enemy

"We have tried to communicate to the Chinese that we don't view them as an enemy; we don't wish to make them an enemy," Secretary of State Colin Powell said.

"But at the same time, we have to be realistic about the relationship . . . They're not a strategic partner. They are a trading partner," Powell added.

One battle his predecessors fought that President Bush gets to sidestep is renewing China's eligibility for preferential trade treatment.

Divisive annual congressional battles over China's trade status were ended by last year's vote to give China permanent normal trade relations, as part of its bid to join the World Trade Organization.

President Bush, who spent some time in China as a youth when his father was U.S. envoy in Beijing, will follow up on this week's talks with a visit to Beijing in October.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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