From: Michael Craig, Co-Chair, China Human Rights Group

Toronto, December 13, 1995 (CHRG) -- In China today President Jiang Zemin and Prime Minister Li Peng have shot themselves in both feet. Last week they rejected the Dalai Lama's candidate for Panchen Lama, the second most important religious leader of Tibetan Buddhism, and imposed their own choice, the six-year-old son of Communist Party members.

Their interference in the religious affairs of the Tibetan people perpetuates a conflict that will go on for decades. And what are they going to do with the Dalai Lama's choice, Gedhun Choekyi Nyima, who has been detained since May? The boy will be a perpetual reminder of the absurdity of atheist Communist leaders imposing their religious will to serve a political agenda.

We fear he may be murdered unless world leaders vigourously protest. Thus Jiang and Li shot themselves in the left foot. And yesterday, by setting up a farcical show trial to sentence the famous dissident and Nobel Prize nominee, Wei Jingsheng, to fourteen years in prison for "trying to overthrow the government", they created a martyr--and shot themselves in the right foot.

What fools these despots are--so terrified of freedom of speech that they imprison a man who has done nothing but cautiously speak out in favour of democracy and human rights.

In the short term, Li and Jiang will likely get away with this outrage. The Chinese people are like a man with a gun at his head being told to testify that black is white. Naturally he says, "Yes, sir, that's the whitest black I've ever seen." But in the back of his mind he curses the tyrant who holds the gun.

Some western "leaders" like Jean Chretien, Canada's Prime Minister, will also say only what the Chinese leaders want to hear. To them, trade with China is a higher priority than people's lives. But, as they face protesters and political opposition every day, isn't it obvious that, in the backs of their minds, these western leaders are whispering their contempt for the despots of Beijing?

The point is that most of the time brutal repression and economic power will control what most of the people say. But you can't force them to respect you. You can't control the backs of their minds.

Also, in the long term you can't dictate what historians write. Li and Jiang must be very anxious as they see the Russians rewriting the history of that other great murderer, Joseph Stalin. Do they naively believe that Chinese history books in the middle of the 21st Century will applaud the imprisonment of Wei Jingsheng and commend their brutal regime?

So, on this sad day, Jiang and Li stand nervously before their people with their feet blown off. But, of course, the image doesn't really work because, when you shoot yourself in both feet, you inevitably fall down.

Michael Craig, Co-Chair December, 1995

China Human Rights Group PH/FX 416-588-4966