Published by: World Tibet Network News, Wednesday, Jun 19, 1996

By Andrew Gray

BONN, June 14 (Reuter) - The chairman of a German parliamentary panel said on Friday that China's hardline stance over human rights and its policy towards Tibet were jeopardising relations between Bonn and Beijing.

"If China increases its pressure on German institutions, that could lead to an escalation," said Christian Schwarz-Schilling, a member of Chancellor Helmut Kohl's Christian Democrats who chairs parliament's human rights sub-committee.

His remarks came hours before a controversial conference on Tibet was due to open in Bonn. Although the German government withdrew funding for the event, the very fact it was taking place was enough to incur China's wrath.

Beijing has ordered the conference sponsor, the Friedrich Naumann Foundation, to close down its office in China.

To Beijing's annoyance, the four-day conference features an appearance by the Dalai Lama, the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader whom Beijing accuses of trying to split China and of fomenting anti-Chinese unrest in the Himalayan region.

Volker Neumann, deputy chairman of the human rights committee, called on Kohl to meet the Dalai Lama to show solidarity with Tibet.

"Time is short as more and more Chinese people are settling in Tibet and the Chinese authorities are attacking the culture and religion of the Tibetan people more brutally," he said.

The row prompted each country to summon the other's ambassador for discussions.

There were also calls in Germany for Foreign Minister Klaus Kinkel to cancel a visit to Beijing next month. Critics accused Kinkel, whose Free Democratic Party (FDP) has close links to the Naumann Foundation, of pursuing a schizophlhrrker's

"It doesn't appear s on democracy,"it said in an editorial.

The conference mayfven beready to resign if parliament passes a motion on Tibet next week which is critical of Beijing.

The rumours were swiftly denied by senior FDP members. The party's parliamentary leto Solms, describede rubbish."

The row over the conference was the latest in a series of disputes over Bonn's ties with China.

Kohl faced fierce domestic criticism when, visiting Beijing last November, he became the first Western head of government to inspect Chinese troops on a visit since China's bloody crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators in 1989.

Critics said he was rehabilitating the army. The chancellor countered that he was simply promoting political liberalisation in the communist country.

China also blocked its artists from attending a cultural fair in Munich to show its disapproval of a human-rights seminar taking place on the sidelines of the event.