Officials from China and the U.S. will meet to discuss human rights next week in Beijing, but Washington’s announcement of the talks indicates that they may not be routine. The New York Times reports:
According to a statement issued by the State Department, the two sides are to meet Wednesday and Thursday in Beijing for what has become a regular springtime meeting on human rights.
But the statement was highly unusual for several reasons, not least because Washington made the announcement for a meeting to be held in Beijing — which runs counter to diplomatic protocol — and because it was made just days before the event.
[…] “Objectively speaking, the announcement is being made at the last minute,” said Joshua Rosenzweig of the Dui Hua Foundation, a rights group in Hong Kong. “It’s also interesting that the U.S. is making it unilaterally and that they’re using this language.”
The American announcement bluntly says that the talks will focus on “the recent negative trend of forced disappearances, extralegal detentions and arrests and convictions” — highly unusual in such a statement and most likely reflecting Washington’s growing frustration with the human rights situation in China.
