THE British Foreign Secretary, Mr Malcolm Rifkind, yesterday urged China to be open about conditions in its orphanages. He said he had told the Chinese Foreign Minister, Mr Qian Qichen, "that the best way in which China could reassure the world that there were no abuses at these orphanages was to allow complete transparency, completely open contact to show that there was nothing to hide. And we very much hope that that kind of assurance can be given."
Mr Rifkind was speaking after more than two hours of discussions with Mr Qian, in which both sides appeared to have decided not to let Beijing's anger over last night's screening in Britain of the television documentary. Return to the Dying Rooms disrupt negotiations over Hong. Kong. Despite warnings earlier in the day that the programme was "certainly harmful for the environment of these discussions", the foreign ministry spokesman, Mr Chen Jian, later characterised the foreign ministers' meeting as "frank and pragmatic" and its outcome "beneficial".
In a positive sign that Sino British relations' are continuing to improve, the Chinese confirmed that Mr Rifkind would today meet the prime minister, Mr Li Peng, and will tomorrow hold talks with President Jiang Zemin.
In his first visit as foreign secretary to China, Mr Rifkind said he had raised a number of human rights issues with Mr Qian, including the recent Human Rights Watch report on Chinese orphanages, the 14 year jail sentence for the dissident Mr Wei Jingsheng, and Tibet.
He said the Chinese side had defended their position that there was no abuse of the country's orphans "in very robust terms but at no time was it implied that the subject matter of the programmed would have any implications for the relations between the British and Chinese governments."
The British minister said that "with regard to Wei Jingsheng, we emphasised our view ... that the sentence imposed upon him seemed very, very harsh indeed when one thinks of what seems to be the relatively minor offences with which he was charged." Mr Qian repeated the Chinese position that the sentence was "Justified" by the alleged crimes.
On the question of resolving outstanding issues over HongKong, Mr Rifkind reported progress in several are. The most important of these was a commitment from Mr Qian "that all those persons with permanent resident status who are know in. Hong Kong will continue to have resident status after 1997."
The British side said the Chinese government had also agreed to give the go ahead to the "vexed question" of the stalled CT9 container port. "We have been informed that the Chinese government can accept whatever the companies (in the consortium) themselves agree. That is very satisfactory," said Mr Rifkind.