The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mrs Mary Robinson, yesterday met the Chinese president, Mr Jiang Zemin, in Beijing and told him - according to the official Chinese news agency, Xinhua - that "the high commissioner's office will co-operate more with the Chinese government in the area of human rights".
This spin by the Chinese side - Mrs Robinson has been trying to get Beijing to co-operate with the high commission rather than the other way around - reflects a confidence in the Chinese leadership that it is successfully finessing human rights as an international issue.
Mrs Robinson and the Chinese vice-minister of foreign affairs, Mr Wang Guangya, signed a memorandum of understanding on technical co-operation on human rights on Monday at the start of a two-day visit by her to Beijing. Mrs Robinson called it a "milestone" but it has been criticised as toothless by human rights advocates.
The agreement provides for the UN body to advise China's police, courts and prisons on legal procedures, and to monitor legal changes needed to comply with two UN rights treaties which China has signed.
It does not commit Beijing to participate in any programmes to ensure human-rights standards. Since negotiations on the agreement began two years ago China has continued cracking down on dissent.
Hundreds of members of the Falun Gong spiritual movement have been jailed or sent to "re-education through labour" camps, and dozens have died from their treatment in custody.
The re-education through labour sentence, with its lack of due process, was "not compatible with international norms" and would be taken up by her office at a February workshop, Mrs Robinson said.
She also said China had a "very significant way to go" in meeting international standards of freedom of expression, association and religious belief.
China refused to allow the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture, Sir Nigel Rodley, make free visits to the country, it emerged. "China has invited him to pay a `friendly visit' but he rightly points out that he has standard procedures for country visits and these must also apply in China," Mrs Robinson said. During his meeting with Mrs Robinson, President Jiang said the world should be a "colourful" one and all countries should have the right to choose their own form of democracy and political system, Xinhua reported. Mrs Robinson said China was unique in the stress it placed on stability.
"My message really is that social stability can be helped by a strong regime of commitment to the international human-rights norms and standards," she told a press conference. She again urged China to move more quickly to ratify the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and the Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.