Pelosi says China stalling on human rights

(Bangkok Post-AFP) -US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Friday that she saw no progress in China on human rights, regretting that neither economic reforms nor US pressure were making Beijing budge.

U.S. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) arrives in D.C. for a "Remembrance and Reconciliation" rally marking the 20th anniversary of protests in Tiananmen Square in June 2009. Pelosi said that she saw no progress in China on human rights, regretting that neither economic reforms nor US pressure were making Beijing budge.

Pelosi, a long-time human rights advocate who visited China last week, deplored that Beijing was still holding prisoners for taking part in the Tiananmen Square democracy protests crushed 20 years ago this week.

"Twenty years later people are still being incarcerated for speaking out about anything other than the party line," Pelosi said. "I don't know that this is an evolution."

"I know that just our advocacy didn't accomplish any freedom in China. So somehow or other we have to find a way to do that," she told the Brookings Institution think-tank.

Pelosi said she praised China's leadership in her meetings for lifting millions out of poverty, calling it a "remarkable" achievement.

"The problem I have is that -- people say, 'Well, look at Taiwan, look at (South) Korea, different places' -- economic reform leads to political reform," she said.

"What I see in China is that economic reform is being used to suppress the political reform -- 'You have a job, okay, I'm happy.' So it isn't the natural peaceful evolution, which they will never subscribe to," she said.

Pelosi rejected perceptions that she had softened her stance on her recent trip.

She said she was able to raise human rights concerns at the highest level as House speaker, the third-highest leader under the US Constitution. She said she directly petitioned President Hu Jintao to free jailed rights activists.

Pelosi said she had no regrets about infuriating Beijing's leaders in 1991 by unfurling a banner in Tiananmen Square in tribute "to those who died for democracy in China."

"It isn't that my view has changed so much as my role has changed," Pelosi said. "This is a relentless pursuit of mine."