NEWS
ANALYSIS
In Visiting Taiwan, Pelosi Capped Three Decades
of Challenging China
From her first days in Congress, the future speaker
was willing to confront China’s leaders. As she looked toward her legacy, the
California Democrat was not about to back down this time.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan was in keeping
with her deep-seated position that China must be held to account for its
posture toward Tibet and Hong Kong, as well as
its treatment of ethnic minorities and political activists.
Carl Hulse
By Carl
Hulse
Aug. 2,
2022
阅读简体中文版閱讀繁體中文版
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/02/us/politics/pelosi-taiwan-china-record.html
WASHINGTON
— In 1991, a trio of junior House members on a bipartisan trip to Asia was
encouraged by a Chinese dissident they visited in Hong Kong to make a gesture
of solidarity with government opponents and victims of the Tiananmen Square
massacre when they reached Beijing.
They
quickly embraced the daring idea.
“We were
all nodding in agreement at the same time,” recalled Ben Jones, then a
Democratic congressman from Georgia who made the trip along with John Miller, a
Republican from Washington, and Nancy Pelosi, then an up-and-coming Democrat
from California.
Sneaking
away to the huge square where a rebellion had been brutally put down two years
earlier, the three American visitors unfurled a banner provided by the
dissidents and smuggled to the mainland by Mr. Jones.
“To those
who died for democracy in China,” read a message embroidered in Chinese and
English.
The brazen
display provoked a quick police response and a diplomatic tiff — though nothing
on the scale of the international uproar surrounding Tuesday’s visit to Taiwan
by Ms. Pelosi, who is now the speaker of the House.
But the two
events are linked by Ms. Pelosi’s longstanding activism regarding China. Her
current clash is just the latest in a more than three-decade career of
challenging the Chinese government on human rights and other issues. And it was
another example of a time when the most powerful woman in Washington did not
shy away from what she considered a worthy fight.
Her allies
said that if someone had leaked the plans of her trip hoping that the angry
pushback from the Chinese government or the worries expressed by the Biden
White House could dissuade her from going, they were sorely mistaken.
“They
picked the wrong person,” said Representative Jim McGovern, Democrat of
Massachusetts, who has worked with Ms. Pelosi on human rights issues regarding
China and visited there with her in the past. “She is someone who can’t be
intimidated. She doesn’t give in to bullies.”
Though her
refusal to abandon the trip in the face of Chinese threats and White House
fretting struck some as reckless, the visit was in keeping with Ms. Pelosi’s
deep-seated position that China must be held to account for its posture toward
Tibet and Hong Kong, as well as its treatment of the Uyghurs and the
imprisonment of political activists.
It was also
characteristic of the California Democrat whose job puts her second in line to
the presidency. She has rarely shrunk from public threats from her adversaries,
and has sometimes gone out of her way to remind them of the stiffness of her
spine.
Ms. Pelosi,
82, who has said she will wind down her speakership after this Congress, is
also looking toward her legacy, one that includes an unapologetic stance toward
China.
Since the
administrations of Presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton, Ms. Pelosi has
insisted that the economic benefits of a U.S. relationship with China could not
be allowed to overshadow its human rights record or deter strong criticism from
national leaders.
“If we do
not speak out for human rights in China because of economic concerns, then we
lose the moral authority to talk about human rights in any other place in the
world,” Ms. Pelosi said last year, marking the 32nd anniversary of the
Tiananmen Square massacre.
She has
regularly pushed legislation on behalf of Hong Kong and Tibet; hosted the Dalai
Lama, the Tibetan spiritual leader, on Capitol Hill; and called for a
diplomatic boycott of the Olympics in Beijing. She repeatedly broke with Mr.
Clinton on his drive to bestow and sustain favored trade status for China, a
policy he said could improve human rights in China through international
engagement. Ms. Pelosi vehemently disagreed.
“By
following a policy which bolsters the Chinese government, the United States is
actually supporting the containment of the Chinese people, their hopes and
aspirations,” said Ms. Pelosi in 1997 as she took the Clinton White House to
task.
China has
taken note of her frequent criticism. Following her call last year for an
Olympic boycott, a foreign ministry official accused her of spreading “lies and
disinformation” and playing “despicable political games” by using human rights
as a pretext to “smear and slander China.”
In an
opinion piece published Tuesday in The Washington Post, Ms. Pelosi reminded
readers of her trip to Tiananmen Square 30 years ago.
“Since
then,” Ms. Pelosi wrote, “Beijing’s abysmal human rights record and disregard
for the rule of law continue, as President Xi Jinping tightens his grip on
power.”
Allies
noted that Ms. Pelosi’s position on China is undergirded not just by the Asian
constituency in her San Francisco district but also by her long service on the
House Intelligence Committee, including a stint as chairwoman.
“This is a
continuation of work and leadership that she has been doing for 33 years,” said
Carolyn Bartholomew, a former chief of staff to Ms. Pelosi who is now a member
of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission.
Given her
history with China, her decision to follow through on her trip despite warnings
from both Chinese and American officials was no surprise to her fellow
lawmakers.
“This isn’t
something that came out of the blue,” said Mr. McGovern. “This has been an
issue for her every day she has been in the United States Congress. She is an
extraordinary human rights champion.”
She also
drew strong support from Republicans — normally her harshest critics — who
lauded her decision to carry out her plan to visit Taiwan and said she had no
choice after the Chinese government threatened retaliation should she arrive in
Taipei.
“I’m about
to use four words in a row that I haven’t used in this way before, and those
four words are: ‘Speaker Pelosi was right,’” declared Senator Roy Blunt of
Missouri, a member of the Republican leadership. “For us to make the point that
Taiwan is important to democracy, that Taiwan is important to our national
security, that Taiwan is important to our economy is a good point to make,” he
added. “And I suspect others will be following Speaker Pelosi’s example.”
Privately,
some Democrats complained about the timing of the visit, which had been
postponed from April after the speaker tested positive for the coronavirus.
They said the furor was drawing attention away from some Democratic successes
in Congress and seemed to reflect a desire to command the world stage with her
time as speaker running out.
But most
familiar with Ms. Pelosi’s views on China said they had little to do with the
politics of the moment.
“She was
very strong on human rights,” said Mr. Jones, a former television actor who
served two terms in the House and still has the protest banner he and Ms.
Pelosi unfurled in Tiananmen Square 30 years ago in his home in Virginia. “I
totally respect her for that, because it does take courage.”
Carl Hulse
is chief Washington correspondent and a veteran of more than three decades of
reporting in the capital. @hillhulse
.jpg)
Sem comentários:
Enviar um comentário