<DOC>
[110th Congress House Hearings]
[From the U.S. Government Printing Office via GPO Access]
[DOCID: f:40784.wais]
WOMEN AND THE LAW
=======================================================================
REPRINTED
from the
2007 ANNUAL REPORT
of the
CONGRESSIONAL-EXECUTIVE COMMISSION ON CHINA
ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
OCTOBER 10, 2007
__________
Printed for the use of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.cecc.gov
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CONGRESSIONAL-EXECUTIVE COMMISSION ON CHINA
LEGISLATIVE BRANCH COMMISSIONERS
House Senate
SANDER LEVIN, Michigan, Chairman BYRON DORGAN, North Dakota, Co-Chairman
MARCY KAPTUR, Ohio MAX BAUCUS, Montana
MICHAEL M. HONDA, California CARL LEVIN, Michigan
TOM UDALL, New Mexico DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California
TIMOTHY J. WALZ, Minnesota SHERROD BROWN, Ohio
DONALD A. MANZULLO, Illinois SAM BROWNBACK, Kansas
JOSEPH R. PITTS, Pennsylvania CHUCK HAGEL, Nebraska
EDWARD R. ROYCE, California GORDON H. SMITH, Oregon
CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey MEL MARTINEZ, Florida
EXECUTIVE BRANCH COMMISSIONERS
PAULA DOBRIANSKY, Department of State
CHRISTOPHER R. HILL, Department of State
HOWARD M. RADZELY, Department of Labor
Douglas Grob, Staff Director
Murray Scot Tanner, Deputy Staff Director
(ii)
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Status of Women.............................................. 1
Population Planning.......................................... 6
Health....................................................... 9
Human Trafficking............................................ 16
North Korean Refugees in China............................... 20
Freedom of Residence and Travel.............................. 23
Endnotes..................................................... 27
Status of Women
introduction
The Commission has noted in the past that the Chinese
government has been more vigorous in publicizing and condemning
abuse against women than in other areas concerning human
rights.\1\ In 2003, 2004, and 2006, the Commission observed
that, while China had built an expansive legal framework to
protect women's rights and interests, loopholes and inadequate
implementation remained that left women vulnerable to
widespread abuse, discrimination, and harassment at home and in
the workplace.\2\ The Commission noted in 2004-2006 that
China's economic reforms have increased opportunities for women
to build their own businesses, but these reforms still leave
many women, when compared to men, with fewer employment
opportunities, less earning power, less access to education,
especially in rural areas, and increasing risks from HIV/
AIDS.\3\ In its 2004-2006 Annual Reports, the Commission also
noted the existence of women's organizations that advocate on
behalf of women's rights within the confines of government and
Communist Party policy.\4\ In its 2005 Annual Report, the
Commission observed that China's Constitution and laws provide
for the equal rights of women, but, as noted in 2006, vague
language and inadequate implementation continue to hinder the
effectiveness of legal protections written in the Constitution
and national laws.\5\
laws and institutions
The Chinese Constitution and laws provide for the equal
rights of women.\6\ In addition, the Program for the
Development of Chinese Women seeks to increase women's
development by 2010 in areas of the economy, decisionmaking and
management, education, health, law, and the environment.\7\
CECC Annual Reports dating from 2003 have noted that the number
of laws and regulations promoting the equal rights of women has
expanded, with a noticeable difference after 2004.
In August 2005, the National People's Congress (NPC)
Standing Committee passed an amendment to the Law on the
Protection of Women's Rights and Interests (LPWRI), which
prohibit sexual harassment and domestic violence, and require
government entities at all levels to give women assistance to
assert their rights in court.\8\ At least nine provincial and
municipal governments have passed regulations to strengthen the
implementation of the LPWRI.\9\ For example, Shanghai's
regulations, passed in April 2007, explicitly prohibit five
types of sexual harassment, namely verbal, written, pictorial,
electronic transmission of information such as text messaging,
and physical sexual harassment.\10\ The 2002-2004 Annual
Reports noted that although there was initially no specific law
on sexual harassment, people began to file sexual harassment
cases in court and several women won lawsuits against their
employers, in part due to greater economic openness and
government and women's organizations' efforts to build
awareness.\11\ In addition, at least 15 provincial and
municipal governments have detailed domestic violence
regulations, and the Ministry of Public Security and the All-
China Women's Federation (ACWF), among others, issued
guidelines in 2007 that will legally obligate police officers
to respond immediately to domestic violence calls and to assist
domestic violence victims, or face punishment.\12\
Previous annual reports have noted that the lack of a
national definition on key terms, such as discrimination
against women and sexual harassment, hinder effective
implementation of the amended LPWRI and other policy
instruments.\13\ In addition, even though the amended Marriage
Law of 2001 and the amended LPWRI prohibit domestic violence,
``domestic violence'' is not defined, and case rulings in
domestic violence cases are inconsistent due to the lack of
clear standards in laws and judicial explanations.\14\ Other
hurdles in accessing justice include domestic violence victims
bearing the burden in bringing complaints, lack of detailed
provisions on how to implement policy measures, and limited
public understanding and awareness, among other factors.\15\
Recent surveys show that domestic violence and sexual
harassment remain widespread. For example, 30 percent of
Chinese families experience
domestic violence, and 74.8 percent of female migrant workers
engaged in the service industry in Changsha city report
experiencing some form of verbal or physical sexual
harassment.\16\
gender disparities
Economy
China's transition to a market economy has had
contradictory
influences on the social status of women, who contribute to
over 40 percent of China's gross domestic product, offering
them both ``greater freedom and mobility,'' and ``greater
threats . . . at home and in the workplace.'' \17\ The
Commission's 2003 Annual Report notes that women workers face
particular hardships in finding a job, as they are often the
first to be fired and the last to be hired, and there exists
weak labor protection measures, inadequate maternity insurance,
unequal compensation and benefits when compared to men for
equal work, and fewer opportunities for advancement, among
other factors.\18\ There are also concerns that women's
participation in the economy is unevenly distributed between
rural and urban areas, and that the market transition has
increased fees in rural areas, impoverishing some families and
harming girls' access to education.\19\ Young women are
increasingly migrating to urban areas to find work, leaving
them vulnerable to trafficking, forced labor, and other
abuses.\20\
At the same time, some women are succeeding as
entrepreneurs in China, in certain measures even in comparison
to men.\21\ For
example, most of these women entrepreneurs work in small and
medium-sized companies, accounting for 20 percent of the total
number of entrepreneurs in China. Among them, 60 percent have
become successful in the past decade and 95 percent of the
companies that they run have been very successful. These
companies have created more job opportunities for women as
well, since 60 percent of the staff tends to be women.\22\ [See
Section II--Worker Rights.]
Decisionmaking and Management
Women account for 40 percent of government positions, yet
this number may be misleading as very few hold positions with
decisionmaking power. For example, the Ministry of Civil
Affairs estimates that less than 1 percent of village
committees and village-level Communist Party Committees in
China's 653,000 administrative villages were headed by women in
2004. In March 2007, the NPC announced that female
representatives should account for at least 22 percent of the
seats in the 11th NPC, with representatives to be elected by
the end of January 2008, and at least 30
percent of civil servant posts must be held by women.\23\
Various provincial and municipal governments have also
announced gender quotas for positions in their local
governments and local people's congresses.\24\
HIV/AIDS and Health
Chinese health statistics over the past five years continue
to reflect women's disadvantaged status, and also reflect
central and local governments' slow pace in effectively
addressing health issues that are known to disparately impact
women, especially women in rural areas. The Commission's 2005
Annual Report noted that women make up an increasingly larger
percentage of newly reported HIV/AIDS cases, an observation
confirmed by official Chinese government news media.\25\ This
trend has continued in the 2006-2007 reporting period,\26\
although the government has taken some steps to increase HIV/
AIDS awareness among women used in prostitution.\27\ Although
the Commission's 2003 Annual Report observed that China had not
taken the necessary initiatives to increase awareness among
this group, these recent steps suggest a possible positive
development if they are implemented effectively.\28\
China is the only country in the world where the rate of
suicide is higher among women than among men.\29\ According to
the editor of China Women's News, 157,000 women commit suicide
each year in China, 25 percent more than men. In rural areas,
the instance of suicide among women is three to four times
higher than the instance among men, and three to five times
higher than the instance among women who live in urban areas.
Domestic violence is the main cause of suicide among women in
rural areas.\30\ While there has been a decline in maternal
mortality rates since 1991, there is a widening gap between
urban and rural areas, with women in rural areas experiencing
significantly higher mortality rates when compared with
maternal mortality rates in urban areas and the national
average.\31\ Moreover, rural women's rates of illnesses are 5
percent higher when compared with rural men's rates of
illnesses, most likely as a result of long working hours, poor
nutrition and care after childbirth, and the collapse of the
rural cooperative medical system.\32\ [See Section II--Health.]
Access to Education, Especially in Rural Areas
Women continue to have less access to education in rural
areas and lower educational levels when compared to men,
although women's organizations and the government have
initiated programs in recent years to reverse this trend by
providing economic incentives to send girls to school or
seeking to change traditional rural attitudes that give
preference to the education of sons. Despite 99 percent
enrollment rates for girls and boys, only 43 percent of girls
in rural areas, as compared with 61 percent of boys, complete
education higher than junior middle school.\33\ Furthermore,
the National Bureau of Statistics released statistical data in
2006 showing that more than 70 percent of those who are
illiterate and 15 years of age and older are women, a figure
that has increased since 2001.\34\ In an attempt to address
these issues in part, government and government-affiliated
organizations have organized local-level ``Spring Bud''
programs that aim to help girls stay in school around the
country.\35\
Rural Land Reallocation and the Rights of ``Married-Out Women''
``Married-out women'' in rural areas continue to experience
violation of their land and property rights, although judges
have recently ruled in favor of women in certain types of
lawsuits, and some provinces are issuing regulations that seek
to strengthen implementation of existing legal protections.
Village committees, when determining who should be eligible to
receive shares of collectively owned land assets, may order
decisions that legitimize discrimination against ``married-out
women.'' ``Married-out women'' include women who have either
married men from other villages, but whose household
registration (hukou) remains in their birthplace, whose hukou
is transferred from one place back to their birthplace, or
whose hukou is transferred to their husbands' village.
These women are especially vulnerable to violation of their
rights, including rights to use land, to receive compensation
for the land, to use the land for residential purposes, and to
have access to collective welfare resources.\36\ Legal
protections in the form of the PRC Law on Land Contract in
Rural Areas, the Marriage Law, and other laws, guarantee women
the same land rights as men. Judges have ruled in favor of
women in four lawsuits concerning land rights since August
2005, and there have been reports of other successful cases
within the last two years.\37\ Most of these women who have won
lawsuits, however, have been those who still live in their
villages after marrying men from other villages.\38\
There are still tremendous difficulties for ``married-out
women'' to use legal channels to seek redress for violations of
their rights. For example, lawyers have noted that the LPWRI
and relevant regulations in Guangdong province guarantee the
property rights of women, but they lack detailed articles that
could be used to protect these rights.\39\ In addition, each
village also has its own set of laws, which according to the
PRC Organic Law of Village Committees (Organic Law) should not
contravene national laws and regulations.\40\ Yet the Organic
Law does not indicate how to prevent or resolve this
disconnect, with the consequence that some villages uphold
their own laws even when they are in conflict with the LPWRI
and other laws.\41\ In May 2007, Guangdong province passed
regulations to strengthen its implementation of the LPWRI, with
the rule that neither organizations, such as the village
committee, nor individuals can prevent or force rural women to
change their hukou as a result of marriage, divorce, or
widowhood.\42\ In addition, the regulations state that village
rules, laws, and resolutions concerning land rights must not
violate women's rights on the basis of marriage, divorce, or
widowhood.\43\
women's organizations
Women's organizations have been particularly active in the
last few years, although these groups advocate on behalf of
women's rights within the confines of government and Communist
Party policy. The All-China Women's Federation (ACWF), a
Communist Party-led mass organization, plays a supporting role
in the formation of some of these organizations while others
operate more independently and sometimes with unregistered
status.\44\ There were 2,000 active organizations by 1989, and
the Fourth World Conference on Women in 1995 helped to launch
other women's organizations, such as the Center for Women's Law
Studies and Legal Services of Peking University and the Maple
Women's Psychological Counseling Center. In addition, several
women leaders jointly founded the advocacy project Women's
Watch--China in April 2005.
Within the last year, the China Women's University
established a legal center for women and children, and there
have been various seminars and workshops sponsored by
universities, lawyers' associations, and local women's
federations to raise awareness of women's issues among lawyers,
judges, public officials, and academics.\45\ The ACWF works
with the Chinese government to support women's rights,
implement programs for disadvantaged women, and provide a
limited measure of legal counseling and training for women.\46\
As a Party organization, however, the ACWF does not promote
women's interests when such interests conflict with Party
policies that limit women's rights. For example, in 2005, an
ACWF representative in Yunnan province refused to allow a
leading women's rights activist to represent over 500 women in
Yunnan in seeking redress for lost land, on the grounds that
such interference could ``influence stability.'' \47\ In
addition, the ACWF has been silent about the abuses of Chinese
government population planning policies and remains complicit
in the coercive enforcement of birth limits.\48\
non-discrimination in employment and the workplace
Women account for 60 percent of total rural laborers, and
by the end of 2004, there were 337 million women working in
cities and rural areas, which accounted for 44.8 percent of the
total workforce, roughly women's proportion of China's general
population.\49\ Women still face tremendous challenges in the
workplace, and women migrant workers face particular hardship.
For example, more than 70 percent of women in a 2007 survey
reported worrying about losing their jobs after becoming
pregnant, and there have been numerous cases of women dismissed
after they became pregnant.\50\ In addition, a 2006 survey of
women migrant workers
conducted by the ACWF found that only 6.7 percent of surveyed
workers had maternity insurance. Of the 36.4 percent who
reported that they were allowed to take maternity leave, 64.5
percent said this leave was unpaid.\51\ Some local governments
have established programs to provide loans, training, and legal
aid for woman workers.\52\ For example, the legal aid center in
Jinan city provides legal services for migrant women
workers.\53\ The ACWF also has programs such as the Two Million
Project, launched in 2003, which aims to train 2 million laid-
off women so that they can find reemployment.\54\ [See Section
II--Worker Rights.]
continuing challenges in the workplace
The Chinese government has passed a substantial body of
protective legislation, particularly in the area of labor laws
and regulations. For example, the 1978 Temporary Measures on
Providing for Old, Weak, Sick, and Handicapped Cadres
(Temporary Measures) require women to retire at 55, and men at
60.\55\ Chinese academics and government officials have noted
that the Temporary Measures discriminate against women.\56\ In
addition, requirements for employment based on height, weight,
gender, age, and beauty are not uncommon. In 2006, a
transportation company based in Hubei province issued rules
stipulating that female attendants must stay within certain
height and weight requirements, and that attendants whose
weight exceeded 60 kilograms (132 pounds) would be laid
off.\57\ Despite some legal protections, both urban and rural
women in China continue to have limited earning power when
compared to men, and women lag behind men in finding employment
in higher-wage urban areas.\58\
Population Planning
INTRODUCTION
During the past five years, the Chinese government has
maintained population planning policies that violate
international human rights standards. As this Commission noted
in 2006, ``The Chinese government strictly controls the
reproductive lives of Chinese women. Since the early 1980s, the
government's population planning policy has limited most women
in urban areas to bearing one child, while permitting many
women in rural China to bear a second child if their first
child is female. Officials have coerced compliance with the
policy through a system marked by pervasive propaganda,
mandatory monitoring of women's reproductive cycles, mandatory
contraception, mandatory birth permits, coercive fines for
failure to comply, and, in some cases, forced sterilization and
abortion. The Chinese government's population planning laws and
regulations contravene international human rights standards by
limiting the number of children that women may bear, by
coercing compliance with population targets through heavy
fines, and by discriminating against `out-of-plan' children.''
\1\
As this Commission reported in 2005 and 2006, China's
population planning policies in both their nature and
implementation constitute human rights violations according to
international standards. During 2007, human rights abuses
related to China's population planning policies clearly were
not limited to physically coerced abortions. Local officials
have violated Chinese law by punishing citizens, such as
imprisoned legal advocate Chen Guangcheng, who have drawn
attention to population planning abuses by government
officials. Moreover, as described below, population planning
policies have exacerbated imbalanced sex ratios--a male to
female ratio of 118:100, according to the U.S. Department of
State, but reportedly higher in some localities and for second
births.
OVERVIEW OF RECENT DEVELOPMENTS
China's population planning policies exert government
control over women's reproductive lives, impose punitive
measures against citizens not in compliance with the population
planning policies, and engender additional abuses by officials
who implement the policies at local levels. The government
states that population planning policies have prevented more
than 300 million births since implementation, and it justifies
continuing the policies to maintain controls over population
growth.\2\ In 2002, when the Chinese government codified its
population planning policies into national law, an official
stated that China ``does not yet possess the conditions for a
relaxation of [the] birth policy, but there is also no need to
tighten it.'' \3\ A decision issued by the Communist Party
Central Committee and State Council in December 2006 promoted
the continuation of basic national policies on population
planning.\4\ In July 2007, the head of the Population and
Family Planning Commission reiterated that the policies would
remain in place.\5\
China's population planning policies deny Chinese women
control over their reproductive lives. The Population and
Family Planning Law and related local regulations permit women
to bear one child, with limited exceptions.\6\ Women who bear
``out-of-plan'' children face, along with their family members,
harsh economic penalties in the form of ``social compensation
fees'' that can range to multiples of a locality's yearly
average income.\7\ Authorities also subject citizens who
violate population planning rules to demotions or loss of jobs
and other punitive measures.\8\ Authorities have used legal
action and coercive measures to collect money from poor
citizens who cannot afford to pay the fees.\9\ The fees
entrench the disparity between rich and poor, as wealthier
citizens have come to view paying the fees as a way to buy out
of population planning restrictions.\10\ Public officials also
have been able to flaunt restrictions. Official Chinese media
reported in 2007 that the Hunan province family planning
commission found that from 2000 to 2005, nearly 2,000 officials
in the province had violated the Population and Family Planning
Law.\11\ In September 2007, the government and Party announced
new measures to monitor public officials'
adherence to population planning policies and deny promotions
to officials who violate them.\12\ In recent years, the
government has introduced more programs to reward citizens'
compliance with family planning policies, but it has retained
punitive measures.\13\ In May 2007, the national Population and
Family Planning Commission adopted a plan to ``rectify'' out-
of-plan births in urban parts of China.\14\ Controls imposed on
Chinese women and their families, and additional abuses
engendered by the system, from forced abortion to
discriminatory policies against ``out-of-plan'' children,
violate standards in the Convention on the Elimination of All
Forms of Discrimination Against Women,\15\ Convention on the
Rights of the Child,\16\ and the International Covenant on
Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights,\17\ the terms of which
China is bound to uphold as a state party to these treaties.
Abuses in the enforcement of population planning policies
have further eroded citizens' rights. Although the Population
and Family Planning Law provides for punishment of officials
who violate citizens' rights in promoting compliance,\18\
reports from recent years indicate that abuses continue. Media
reports in 2005 publicized abuses in Linyi, Shandong province,
where officials enforced compliance through forced
sterilizations, forced abortions, beatings, and other
abuses.\19\ Citizens who challenge government offenses continue
to face harsh repercussions. After legal advocate Chen
Guangcheng exposed abuses in Linyi, authorities launched a
campaign of harassment against him that culminated in a four-
year, three-month prison sentence imposed in 2006 and affirmed
by a higher court in 2007.\20\ [See also Section II--Rights of
Criminal Suspects and Defendants for more information.]
Structural incentives for local officials to coerce compliance
exacerbate the potential for abuses. In spring 2007, local
officials in Bobai county, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region
(GZAR), initiated a wide-scale campaign to control birthrates
after the GZAR government reprimanded officials for failing to
meet population targets. Officials reportedly required all
women to submit to examinations and subjected women to fines,
forced sterilization, and forced abortions. Authorities looted
homes and seized possessions of citizens who did not pay the
fines.\21\ In May, Bobai residents rioted in protest of
government abuses. Residents of Rong county, also in the GZAR,
protested population planning policies later the same
month.\22\ In one potentially positive development, an
intermediate court in Hebei province agreed in 2007 to hear a
couple's lawsuit against a local family planning commission for
a forced abortion seven years ago, reportedly the first time a
court has taken an appeal in this type of case.\23\
The government has taken limited steps to address social
problems exacerbated by population planning policies, such as
unbalanced sex ratios\24\ and decreasing social support for
China's aging population. In 2006, the government announced
that the following year it would extend across China a pilot
project to provide financial support to rural parents with only
one child or two girls, once the parents have reached 60 years
of age.\25\ The Communist Party Central Committee and State
Council decision issued in 2006 describes the unbalanced sex
ratio as ``inevitably influencing social stability,'' advocates
steps to address discrimination against girls and women, and
promotes measures to stop sex-selective abortion.\26\ Sex
ratios stand at roughly 118 male births to 100 female births,
with higher rates in some parts of the country and for second
births. Demographers and population experts consider a normal
male-female birth ratio to be between 103 to 107:100.\27\
In 2006, the National People's Congress Standing Committee
considered, but decided not to pass, a proposed amendment to
the Criminal Law that would have criminalized sex-selective
abortion.\28\ Local governments have instituted prohibitions
against fetal sex-determination and sex-selective abortion. For
example, in 2006, Henan province passed a regulation imposing
financial penalties on these acts where they take place outside
of limited approved parameters.\29\
At the same time the government has taken some steps to
deal with the sex imbalance and discriminatory attitudes toward
girls, some provincial governments have enforced policies that
institutionalize biases against girls by permitting families to
have a
second child where the first child is a girl.\30\ According to
some observers, imbalanced sex ratios and a resulting shortage
of marriage partners have already contributed to, or will
exacerbate in the future, the problem of human trafficking.\31\
[See Section II--Human Trafficking, and Section II--North
Korean Refugees in China.]
Within individual provincial-level jurisdictions, a range
of factors beyond birth rates affect local population growth.
Internal migration has contributed to demographic shifts within
ethnic minority autonomous regions, among other areas. In 2006,
authorities in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region (XUAR)
acknowledged that floating and migrant populations would
continue to contribute to the region's high rate of population
growth, but also announced the government would carry out its
population planning policies by continuing measures to control
birth rates. A series of articles from official media
specifically indicated that the XUAR government would target
impoverished ethnic minority areas as the focus of these
measures.\32\ [See Section II--Ethnic Minority Rights, and
Section IV--Tibet, for more information on population issues in
ethnic minority areas.]
During 2008, the Commission will continue to monitor and
report on violations of international human rights standards in
China related to forced abortions, social compensation fees,
licensing for births, control of women's reproductive cycles,
and all other issues.
Health
MENTAL HEALTH
In December 2006, the Beijing Municipal People's Congress
issued a new Regulation on Mental Health. On its face, the new
regulation prohibits local police from arbitrarily detaining
the city's mentally ill as Beijing prepares to host the 2008
Summer Olympic Games.\1\ Under the new regulation, which went
into effect in March 2007, public security officials may remove
a mentally ill person to a mental health center only if that
person ``harms or poses a serious threat to public safety, a
person's life, or property.'' \2\ The precise meaning of these
words and how they are to be interpreted remain unclear.
The new regulation requires that at least two mental health
doctors make determinations of medical necessity for
involuntary hospital admission. It also provides for review of
involuntary admission by a review body. On these points the
regulation is not dissimilar from the UN Principles for the
Protection of Persons with Mental Illness and for the
Improvement of Mental Health Care.\3\ However, while the UN
Principles provide that the review body complete its review
``as soon as possible'' and ``in accordance with expeditious
procedures,'' the Beijing regulation requires that the review
be completed ``within three months''--a period of time that
could accomplish the purpose of removing persons from the
streets for the duration of the 2008 Olympic Games (August 8-
24, 2008) or longer, without violating the letter of the
law.\4\
HIV/AIDS
Many international experts concur that over the past five
years, the Chinese central government's policies to combat the
spread of HIV/AIDS have, in general, progressively
strengthened. On this issue of importance to China's leaders,
however, the government's worries about uncontrolled citizen
activism and foreign-affiliated nongovernmental organizations
(NGOs) have limited their policies potential effectiveness.
During its best periods, the government has developed a set of
policies and laws and committed funding, and in limited but
important ways engaged international groups and its own NGO
community. China's HIV/AIDS policy has also demonstrated
unusual openness to working with marginalized communities such
as migrant workers, the homosexual community, women and men
used in prostitution, and drug users. Due to these efforts and
the increase in the use of anti-retroviral drugs, the death
rate has reportedly decreased in recent years.\5\
China recorded its first AIDS case in 1989,\6\ and by mid-
2002, official Chinese government and UN figures estimated that
between 1 million to 1.5 million people were infected with
HIV.\7\ Recent UN figures estimate there are about 650,000
people living with HIV in China today, but experts believe this
estimate to be low on account of changes in estimation
methodology and procedures.\8\ While China is a country with a
low prevalence of the disease nationwide, health experts say
the disease is moving into the general population, with most
new infections being spread sexually, followed by drug use.\9\
China reported 18,543 new cases of HIV in the first six months
of 2007, which is approximately the number of cases for all of
2006.\10\ Health officials calculate that there were on average
200 new cases of HIV/AIDS infection in China each day in
2005.\11\
In 2007, China announced plans to spend 960 million yuan
(US$127 million) on anti-retroviral drugs, expand public
education, and conduct outreach to China's marginalized
homosexual community.\12\ The government also expanded policies
to further incorporate foreign governments, international
companies, grassroots
organizations, and trade unions in its efforts to combat HIV/
AIDS. In January 2007, the government, along with the
International Labor Organization and the All-China Federation
of Trade Unions, initiated a program that made HIV/AIDS
education available in the workplace.\13\ Privately owned
Chinese firms are also gradually becoming involved in these
efforts, often at the request of their foreign business
affiliates.\14\ In addition, the U.S. Department of Labor
initiated a $3.5 million grant to support a program that
focused on migrant workers.\15\
Nonetheless, while national officials have emphasized the
importance of combating HIV/AIDS, it is local implementation
that determines whether national-level commitment and policy
action produce outcomes of consequence on the ground.
Implementation remains highly problematic. Fear of the disease
has led some local officials to harass persons with HIV/AIDS
and their advocates.\16\ Henan province, where a large number
of villagers contracted HIV through unsanitary blood collection
practices in the late 1980s and early 1990s, provides a
particularly stark example:
<bullet> In June 2003, public security officials, aided
by local residents, raided Xiongqiao village, an ``AIDS
village'' in Henan, and destroyed property, assaulted
residents, and arrested 13 villagers. Villagers had
appealed to local officials to receive previously
promised government assistance for AIDS patients.\17\
<bullet> In May 2004, several people living with HIV/
AIDS in Henan were detained for more than a week,
apparently for seeking
assistance from provincial officials to compel local
officials to provide promised assistance.\18\
<bullet> In 2005, a U.S. NGO reported the violent
closure of a privately run orphanage for children with
AIDS in Henan, and another U.S. group noted that local
officials in Henan have organized militias to prevent
journalists and NGO observers from visiting AIDS
patients.\19\
<bullet> In November 2005, public security officials
detained activist Hu Jia, co-founder of two HIV/AIDS
advocacy groups, when he attempted to deliver a
petition on behalf of more than 50 AIDS patients to
Vice Premier Wu Yi at a November 2005 AIDS
conference in Henan. Citing government pressure, Hu
subsequently resigned in February 2006 from one of the
groups, Loving Source, and is currently under
residential surveillance.\20\
<bullet> In November 2006, public officials detained
HIV/AIDS advocacy group leader Wan Yanhai, forcing him
to cancel a conference on AIDS, blood-transfusion
safety, and legal human rights.\21\
<bullet> In February 2007, public security officials in
Zhengzhou city, Henan, placed AIDS activist and doctor
Gao Yaojie under surveillance at her home in an attempt
to prevent her from traveling to the United States to
accept a human rights award.\22\ Central government
officials intervened, and Gao was subsequently granted
permission to travel to the United States to receive
the 2007 Vital Voices Global Women's Leadership Award
for Human Rights on March 14.\23\
The depth of the crisis is only magnified by official
corruption. In July 2007, the Ministry of Health (MOH)
announced the removal of a director of a Guangdong province
blood center as a result of his involvement in illegal blood
sales and noted that six other people had received sentences of
between 6 and 18 months for helping individuals repeatedly sell
their blood using fake identity cards.\24\ In the hopes of
reducing illegal blood trade activity, the MOH has announced
that blood collection centers are required by the end of
October 2007 to set up equipment to videotape plasma
collections.\25\
A government advisor on AIDS policy has expressed concern
that China's efforts to combat the disease have stalled and
that funding, which in 2006 was 3 billion yuan (US$388
million), remains inadequate.\26\ The government's commitment
to provide care to specific subpopulations, such as children
orphaned as a result of AIDS and ethnic minorities infected
with HIV, appears to be wavering.\27\ Sensitive issues, such as
compensation for rural residents in central provinces who
contracted HIV from the sale of blood, have hindered broader
efforts to combat HIV/AIDS.\28\
At the local level, an overburdened, underfunded healthcare
system makes it difficult for governments to provide the
necessary prevention and treatment programs. Many programs lack
sufficient numbers of qualified doctors to properly administer
anti-retroviral drugs and to help patients maintain needed
treatment, with the result that many patients simply drop out
of the programs. Public education and awareness efforts have
not fully succeeded: 66 percent of China's population
reportedly continues to be unaware of how to protect themselves
against HIV.\29\ AIDS patients have also been discriminated
against and denied treatment at hospitals.\30\
WIDESPREAD DISCRIMINATION AGAINST HEPATITIS B CARRIERS
China has a high rate of hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection,
with 120 million carriers of the virus, who make up
approximately 30 percent of the 400 million HBV carriers in the
world.\31\ Only 70 percent of China's population has been
vaccinated for the disease. In an attempt to reduce hepatitis B
infection, the Ministry of Health (MOH) issued the 2006-2010
National Plan on Hepatitis B Prevention and Control, with the
top priority of strengthening vaccination programs, especially
among young children. The goal is to lower the infection rate
to 1 percent among those five years old and younger, and to
less than 7 percent nationwide by 2010.\32\
Until 2004, there were no national laws protecting HBV
carriers from discrimination in the workplace, and some central
and local governments prohibited the hiring of people with
certain varieties of the disease.\33\ In April 2003, when
university student Zhou Yichao was denied a public service job
because he was an HBV carrier, he stabbed two officials in
Zhejiang province, killing one. Zhou was later sentenced to
death on murder charges.\34\ This incident helped to spark
discussion over the treatment of HBV carriers. In November
2003, HBV carrier Zhang Xianzhu of Anhui province successfully
sued a government personnel office, complaining that his job
application had been unjustly rejected. A court held in April
2004 that the personnel office applied the regulation
incorrectly, but did not invalidate the regulation itself, and
also denied Zhang's request to be reconsidered for the civil
service position, noting that the recruitment season had
already ended.\35\ This was the first partially successful
administrative lawsuit regarding discrimination against HBV
carriers in the workplace.
In 2004, the National People's Congress (NPC) Standing
Committee amended the Law on the Prevention and Control of
Infectious Diseases to prohibit discrimination against persons
with
infectious diseases, persons carrying a pathogen of an
infectious disease, and persons suspected of having an
infectious disease.\36\ In January 2005, the Ministry of
Personnel and the MOH revised
national standards to allow HBV carriers who do not exhibit
symptoms of the disease to apply for employment with the
government.\37\
Yet discrimination against HBV carriers remains widespread.
Even though experts and Chinese officials have publicly stated
that hepatitis B is not infectious in most work and school
situations, many people believe that it is and refuse to hire
HBV carriers or interact with them on those grounds.\38\ A 2005
China Foundation for Hepatitis Prevention and Control survey,
covering 583 hepatitis B patients in 18 provinces, found not
only that a majority of Chinese physicians do not have adequate
knowledge of hepatitis B or of ways to prevent and treat the
disease, but also that 52 percent of the respondents had faced
discrimination in employment and education.\39\ In November
2005, two universities in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region
(XUAR) suspended 156 students, diagnosed as hepatitis B
positive in their matriculation medical examinations, from
their studies for a year.\40\ Students formed an action group
and distributed fliers to protest this decision, and one
student filed the first hepatitis B discrimination lawsuit in
the XUAR against her university, Xinjiang Agricultural
University.\41\ The student eventually withdrew her case as
university authorities allowed her to resume her studies amid
widespread media coverage, and support from NGOs and concerned
individuals.\42\ As of December 2006, the other students were
reportedly still not able to return to school.\43\
In September 2006, Urumqi municipal education officials in
the XUAR expelled 19 high school students who had tested
positive for hepatitis B.\44\ After first attempting to
petition local government bureaus, seven families later filed a
lawsuit against the municipal education bureau, with the hope
that the students would be allowed to continue their
education.\45\ The Urumqi Tianshan District People's Court
postponed the hearing date on several occasions until it
announced on November 20 that the families had withdrawn their
case. The families' lawyer and a NGO that works on hepatitis B
issues believe that the case was dropped due to pressure from
local officials and employers.\46\ In addition, public security
officials forced Snow Lotus, an unregistered NGO based in the
XUAR, to close in October and discontinue its work for
reportedly drafting open letters on behalf of the students and
breaking the story to the media.\47\ [See Section III--Civil
Society for more information on this case.] Local education
officials maintain that the students were expelled in order to
protect other pupils, yet central officials and experts have
condemned the expulsion.\48\ According to Mao Qun'an, a MOH
representative, ``This is prejudice. All these students can go
to school unless they are sick enough to be hospitalized.''
\49\
Most recently, a 2007 survey on health discrimination in
the workplace found that 49 percent of respondents would be
unwilling to work with HBV carriers, and 55 percent noted that
they would not hire HBV carriers.\50\ Employer screening for
HBV remains common, especially in cities.\51\ A Chinese job
applicant filed a lawsuit against Nokia in March 2007, alleging
that its China branch denied him employment after he underwent
a company medical examination and was found to be a HBV
carrier.\52\ The applicant is claiming 500,000 yuan (US$66,613)
in emotional damages in what is reportedly the first hepatitis
B discrimination case against a foreign multinational company
in China.\53\ The Dongguan People's Court accepted the case in
May, and court proceedings began on August 15 and concluded
with a decision by the judge to select a retrial date.\54\ At
press time, the court has yet to publicly issue a decision or a
retrial date. In some online forums, there is active discussion
of this case, as well as other cases of discrimination against
HBV carriers.\55\
In May 2007, the MOH and the Ministry of Labor and Social
Security issued a non-legally binding opinion to protect the
employment rights of HBV carriers, including a prohibition
against mandatory HBV screening for job applicants, except for
those positions that were previously designated as forbidden
for HBV carriers.\56\ On August 30, 2007, the NPC Standing
Committee adopted the Employment Promotion Law, which
stipulates provisions that could benefit HBV carriers seeking
employment.\57\ For example, Article 30 of the new law
prohibits employers from refusing to hire applicants on the
grounds that they carry infectious diseases, except for those
industries barred to formally certified infectious disease
carriers because of the possibility that they might spread the
disease, and Article 62 allows workers to file a lawsuit
against employers who violate provisions of the new law and
discriminate against employees.\58\ Without the concurrent
creation of effective programs to raise public awareness of how
the disease is spread, incentives for local implementation, and
a clear and comprehensive definition of discrimination,\59\ the
impact of these regulatory measures remains to be seen.\60\
STATE CONTROL OF INFORMATION RELATING TO SARS AND AVIAN FLU
In July 2007, military officials denied Dr. Jiang Yanyong
permission to travel to the United States to receive a human
rights award. Dr. Jiang had previously informed foreign media
of government attempts to cover up the SARS outbreak in
2003.\61\ In addition, Chinese laws still require journalists
to get advance approval before publishing public health
information about broad categories of diseases classified as
``state secrets.''
Chinese public health officials sought to improve their
ability to prevent and control the spread of avian flu by
improving the flow of information between lower officials and
higher officials following the mishandling of the SARS epidemic
in 2003. The State Council issued regulations in November 2005
requiring provincial governments to report ``major'' animal
epidemics to the State Council within four hours of discovering
them, and county and city governments to report cases to
provincial authorities within two hours. Officials who are
found negligent in reporting outbreaks face removal from office
and potential prosecution.\62\
Such laws allow for improved internal channels of
information but do not necessarily guarantee free flow of
information to the public. The Law on the Protection of State
Secrets and implementing regulations in the area of public
health continue to serve as a hindrance to the free flow of
information on public health matters. For example, the
Regulation on State Secrets and the Specific Scope of Each
Level of Secrets in Public Health Work, issued in 1996,
categorize as state secrets information on large-scale
epidemics of viral hepatitis and other diseases that has not
been authorized for public disclosure by the government.\63\ A
new national Regulation on the Public Disclosure of Government
Information, issued in April 2007, contains provisions that
require agencies to disclose information on public health
supervision and sudden emergencies, but these ``state secret''
exceptions remain in place.\64\ [See Section II--Freedom of
Expression.]
HEALTHCARE SYSTEM REFORM
During the 1980s, the government abolished its previous
rural healthcare system, which was based on village clinics
staffed by ``barefoot doctors'' and financed by cooperative
insurance.\65\ The government did not replace the previous
system with a new rural cooperative medical system until
2003.\66\ From 1977 to 2002, the number of doctors in rural
China decreased from 1.8 million to 800,000, and the number of
rural healthcare workers decreased from 3.4 million to
800,000.\67\ Eighty percent of medical resources are now
concentrated in cities.\68\ The rural-urban disparity is also
apparent in mortality statistics. Residents of large cities in
China live 12 years longer than rural residents, and the infant
mortality rate in some rural areas is nine times higher than in
large cities.\69\
Urban Healthcare
The government established a public health insurance
program for employed urban residents in 1998, and by the end of
2006,
approximately 160 million out of the country's 500 million
urban residents received coverage.\70\ In July 2007, Premier
Wen Jiabao announced plans to establish a national health
insurance program to cover all urban residents, including
children, the elderly, and the uninsured, over the next three
years. The central government has selected 79 cities to launch
pilot programs by the end of September 2007.\71\ In order to
improve community-level medical services in urban areas, large
city hospitals will provide facility and staff support to
community health clinics, and a data-sharing system will be
established.\72\
Rural Healthcare
Under China's Rural Cooperative Medical System (RCMS), a
farmer and each family member that participates in the system
pays an average premium of 10 yuan (US$1.25) each year into a
personal medical care account, with governments at all levels
subsidizing an additional 40 yuan (US$5) on average.\73\
Participants may have up to 65 percent of their healthcare
costs reimbursed, but are required to first pay such costs out
of pocket.\74\ The scope of the RCMS's coverage, and government
spending on healthcare, has increased in recent years. The
government reported that the number of counties covered by the
RCMS increased from 687 pilot counties in 2005 to 1,451
counties (50.7 percent of China's rural areas) at the end of
2006.\75\ Prior to implementation of the RCMS, the percentage
of rural residents with health insurance coverage reportedly
reached a low of 7 percent in 2002.\76\ After the RCMS was
introduced in 2003, the government reported that coverage had
increased to 51 percent by February 2007.\77\ The amount of
money the central government has announced it plans to spend on
rural healthcare also increased from 2.073 billion yuan (US$252
million) in 2004 to 5.8 billion yuan (US$750 million) in 2006,
and reportedly to 10.1 billion yuan (US$1.33 billion) in
2007.\78\ Since the establishment of the RCMS, some areas have
reported increases in the number of hospitalized patients and
in the amount of revenue for local clinics.\79\
Rising Cost of Healthcare
Some senior Chinese officials and scholars have questioned
the fairness and efficiency of the medical and healthcare
system. The poorest residents in rural areas frequently do not
enroll in the cooperatives because they cannot afford the
required fee. As many as 50 percent of farmers who fall ill do
not seek healthcare for economic reasons, and half of all
children who die in rural areas had not received medical
treatment.\80\ For rural participants especially, the
reimbursement level remains inadequate. The average
reimbursement rate is 27.5 percent, determined in part by the
specific disease and the local government's budget.\81\ Many
counties and townships do not have the financial resources to
supply their portion of the fund. In addition, rural clinics
are poorly funded and lack adequate medical personnel and
equipment.\82\
High medical costs have become the top concern of Chinese
citizens, according to a 2006 Chinese Academy of Social
Sciences survey on ``Problems that Affect Social Harmony and
Stability,'' with medical expenses comprising 11.8 percent of
an average family's total annual spending.\83\ There has also
been an increase in violent attacks on doctors and hospital
personnel as citizens protest rising costs, medical errors, and
declining professional ethics.\84\ In 2006, hospitals reported
9,831 cases of violence, more than 200 million yuan (US$25.6
million) in damages to hospital facilities, and 5,519 medical
personnel injuries, an increase from 5,093 cases of violence,
67 million yuan (US$8.8 million) in damages, and 2,600 medical
personnel injuries in 2002.\85\
To address some of these issues, the Ministry of Health
relocated approximately 5,500 doctors and nurses from urban
areas to rural areas in 2007 to treat rural patients and train
local medical personnel.\86\ In addition, the central
government has set a goal of renovating 22,000 village clinics,
1,300 county-level general hospitals, 400 county-level
traditional or ethnic minority hospitals, and 950 county-level
maternity and childcare institutes by 2010, and has pledged
more than 20 billion yuan (US$2.5 billion) for the task.\87\
Human Trafficking
INTRODUCTION
The Chinese government has taken some steps to establish a
national-level anti-trafficking coordinating mechanism, to
increase public awareness, to expand the availability of some
social services for victims of trafficking, and to improve
international cooperation. The Chinese government reports that
efforts have led to a decline in some forms of trafficking, but
also notes that there has been an increase in other forms of
trafficking that have not received as much attention, such as
using trafficking victims to perform forced labor or engage in
commercial sex. Within the past five years, for example, there
has been a rise in cross-border trafficking cases, with
internal and international traffickers increasingly working
together. The U.S. State Department also notes that the Chinese
government ``continued to treat North Korean victims of
trafficking as economic migrants, routinely deporting them back
to horrendous conditions in North Korea.'' \1\
DEVELOPMENTS IN THE PAST YEAR
The National People's Congress Standing Committee revised
the PRC Law on the Protection of Minors on December 29, 2006,
which became effective June 1, 2007, to explicitly prohibit the
trafficking of minors.\2\ Article 41 of the revised law
contains new provisions that prohibit the trafficking,
kidnapping, and maltreatment, including sexual exploitation, of
minors, although these terms are not
defined.\3\ In July 2007, the All-China Women's Federation
(ACWF) and the Ministry of Public Security (MPS) held the first
National Anti-Trafficking Children's Forum, in which an MPS
spokesperson noted the increase in the number of cases of
forced labor trafficking and trafficking for commercial sexual
exploitation, and an annual decrease in the number of cases
handled by the MPS that relate to the trafficking of women and
children for marriage and adoption.\4\
Official Chinese case statistics suggest, however, that
China is either not publishing accurate data on the incidence
of human trafficking, uses non-standard categories for these
crimes, or has low prosecution rates in these cases. In 2005,
the MPS reported that Chinese police departments nationwide
opened 2,884 cases of ``abducting women and children,'' of
which they reported ``investigating and handling'' just over
2,400 cases. In 2006, the total number of cases investigated
and resolved was just over 2,100. Police press reports portray
the trends as evidence that such abduction cases have declined
in society since the 1980s and 1990s, and as proof of the
``obvious effectiveness'' of their policies.\5\ By contrast,
the U.S. State Department's 2007 Trafficking in Persons Report
notes that ``an estimated minimum of 10,000 to 20,000 victims''
are trafficked internally each year.\6\ The ACWF-MPS forum also
touched on legal protections for trafficking victims. According
to the MPS spokesperson, ``In trafficking and abduction
aspects, China's legal protection is underdeveloped, and it
needs to be further strengthened.'' \7\ The forum noted, for
example, that China's Criminal Law provides punishment for the
trafficking of women and children, but neglects minors over 14
and male adults, who are often targeted for forced labor.\8\
TRENDS IN THE PAST FIVE YEARS
China's Ministry of Public Security reports that efforts to
combat human trafficking have led to a decline in some forms of
trafficking, but that there has also been an increase in other
forms of trafficking that have not received as much attention,
such as using trafficking victims to perform forced labor.\9\
As the U.S. State Department reports in its annual review of
global human trafficking, China ``is a source, transit, and
destination country'' for human trafficking.\10\ Domestic
trafficking continues to comprise the majority of trafficking
cases in China. Women and children, who make up 90 percent of
the cases, are trafficked from poorer provinces to more
prosperous provinces on the east coast.\11\ Some experts note
that the Chinese government's attention to human trafficking
for commercial sexual exploitation appears to be uneven, with
far greater concern shown towards the internal trafficking of
Chinese girls and women and little concern over foreign girls
and women who are trafficked into China or who enter China
voluntarily but are subsequently trafficked. Many of these
women are from Vietnam, North Korea, and Mongolia, among other
countries, and are treated as immigration violators who are
detained and subsequently repatriated.\12\
There have also been increases in the number of cross-
border trafficking cases and, especially between 2004 and 2006,
an increase in the number of infant trafficking cases.\13\ The
rising number of infant trafficking cases in China reflects
many factors, such as China's population planning policies,
economic disparity, and a lack of awareness among the general
public [see Section II--Population Planning]. Most of the
infants who have been rescued were male, but the increased
demand for children has reportedly driven traffickers to
traffic females as well.\14\ Some of the cases involved social
service organizations buying infants that had been abducted,
and selling them to adoptive families at marked-up prices, as
well as traffickers buying infants from private medical clinics
and other social service organizations and selling them to
buyers elsewhere.\15\ In 2007, the U.S. State Department placed
China on its Tier Two Watch List for the third consecutive year
due to the Chinese government's failure to show evidence of
efforts to improve comprehensive victim protection services and
to address trafficking of persons for forced labor.\16\
INTERNATIONAL LAWS AND OBLIGATIONS
The Chinese government ratified the UN Convention against
Transnational Organized Crime on September 23, 2003, but still
has not ratified its protocol that addresses trafficking in
persons. The protocol represents the first global legally
binding definition of trafficking in persons and aims to
support international cooperation in investigating and
prosecuting cases and in protecting and assisting victims of
trafficking.\17\ In addition, China has ratified the Convention
to Eliminate All Forms of Discrimination against Women and the
Convention on the Rights of the Child, which further legally
bind the Chinese government to suppress and prevent the
abduction and trafficking of women and children.\18\
DOMESTIC EFFORTS TO COMBAT HUMAN TRAFFICKING AND CHALLENGES
Central and local governments have taken steps to combat
trafficking within the past five years, but these initiatives
remain inadequate to effectively address the root causes of
human trafficking and forms of trafficking such as forced
labor. For example, Article 39 of the Law on the Protection of
Women's Rights and Interests (LPWRI), which was amended in
2005, expanded the number of organizations responsible for
preventing trafficking in women and rehabilitating victims,
including local women's federations and local public security,
labor, social security, and health bureaus.\19\ The central
government announced in 2007 that it will establish a national-
level anti-trafficking coordinating mechanism that aims to
strengthen interagency cooperation, as at least seven agencies
currently have regulatory responsibilities to combat
trafficking.\20\
The 2003 and 2004 Commission Annual Reports noted that the
central government initiated several short-term ``Strike Hard''
campaigns to punish traffickers and rescue victims.\21\ But
these campaigns have not proven to be effective instruments
that address the causes of trafficking, nor do they introduce
administrative and legal mechanisms to combat future
trafficking operations. ``Strike Hard'' campaigns have also
been characterized by extensive violations of criminal
procedure rights.\22\ Some provincial and municipal governments
have localized efforts to combat trafficking by creating short-
term rehabilitation centers, and increasing public awareness
efforts that inform people of their legal protections and
resource options.\23\ For example, Sichuan provincial public
security officials have created informational fliers, public
service announcements, and pamphlets that explain legal
protections, resources, and hotline numbers that are aimed at
migrant workers and other workers who are most at risk.\24\ In
addition, within the past year, Yunnan provincial authorities
held a media outreach seminar to raise awareness among
journalists of anti-trafficking strategies, victim protection,
and relevant legislation.\25\
These preliminary steps are positive, but local governments
need to expand them to include more comprehensive victim
rehabilitation services such as psychological counseling and
long-term care. While there are currently legal prohibitions
against some types of human trafficking, these protections do
not prohibit forms of trafficking such as debt bondage or
commercial sexual exploitation that involves coercion or
fraud.\26\ Another hurdle is the difficulty central government
officials face in compelling local law enforcement officials to
aggressively pursue cases that cross jurisdictional boundaries,
especially as more trafficking cases take place across
provincial and national borders.\27\ For example, U.S. experts
have noted that ``local Party dominance over law enforcement
creates powerful
incentives for local police departments to neglect their
responsibilities to share crime-related data and intelligence
with other jurisdictions.'' \28\
INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION
Central and local governments have increased cooperation
with other countries to investigate and prosecute trafficking
cases involving women and children. In particular, the Chinese
government has discussed trafficking in persons with the United
States as part of the bilateral China-U.S. Global Issues Forum,
and has worked to improve its cross-border prosecution efforts
with such countries as Vietnam.\29\ China is also actively
cooperating with international organizations such as the
International Labor Organization, the International
Organization for Migration, and the United Nations Interagency
Project on Human Trafficking in the Greater Mekong Sub-region
on programs to prevent and combat human trafficking.\30\ The
Chinese government has prepared a National Plan of Action to
address the trafficking of women and children, which it still
has not adopted.\31\ A September 4, 2007, China Daily article
noted that the government hopes to adopt the national action
plan by the end of 2007.\32\
North Korean Refugees in China
In 2006-2007, China continued to fail in its obligations to
the thousands of North Korean refugees who crossed its
northeastern border to escape North Korea's chronic food
shortages and political oppression. While an accurate estimate
of the size of this underground population is probably not
possible, in recent years the U.S. State Department and several
NGOs have estimated that 20,000 to 50,000 North Koreans
currently are hiding in northeastern China. Chinese civilian,
law enforcement and military experts speaking in 2005-2006
typically cited an estimate of 30,000 to 50,000.\1\ An October
2006 report by the International Crisis Group surveyed the
opinions of many NGO experts and reached an estimate that the
total number of North Korean refugees residing on Chinese soil
is approximately 100,000.\2\ As noted by the State Department's
2007 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) report, these refugees, many
of whom are women, are unable to work legally in China. Thus,
many of them are highly vulnerable to being kidnapped by
traffickers:
The illegal status of North Koreans in the People's
Republic of China (P.R.C.) and other Southeast Asian
countries increases their vulnerability to trafficking
schemes and sexual and physical abuse. In the most
common form of trafficking, North Korean women and
children who voluntarily cross the border into P.R.C.
are picked up by trafficking rings and sold as brides
to P.R.C. nationals, usually of Korean ethnicity, or
placed in forced labor. In a less common form of
trafficking, North Korean women and girls are lured out
of North Korea by the promise of food, jobs, and
freedom, only to be forced into prostitution, marriage,
or exploitative labor arrangements once in P.R.C.\3\
The U.S. State Department reports that during 2006
``several thousand North Koreans were reportedly detained and
forcibly returned to North Korea.'' \4\ To encourage these
repatriation efforts, central government authorities assign
local public security bureaus in northeastern China a target
number of North Koreans that they must detain in order to
receive favorable work evaluations.\5\ To persuade civilians in
these areas not to assist the refugees, the government also
provides financial rewards to citizens who reveal the
locations of refugees.\6\ By employing these incentive and
punishment systems on citizens to turn these refugees in, China
deliberately undermines its own international legal obligations
to
refrain from repatriating North Koreans and further deters its
citizens from supplying humanitarian assistance. In the past
several years, the government has reportedly built new
detention centers along the Chinese-Mongolian border and the
Chinese-North Korean border in order to accommodate more North
Koreans before it repatriates them.\7\
By returning these refugees to the DPRK , China is in
contravention of its obligations under the 1951 Convention
relating to the Status of Refugees (1951 Convention) and its
1967 Protocol (Protocol). Under the 1951 Convention and its
Protocol, no contracting state may ``expel or return
(`refouler') a refugee in any manner whatsoever to the
frontiers of territories where his life or freedom would be
threatened on account of his race, religion, nationality,
membership of a particular social group or political opinion.''
\8\
The Chinese government classifies all North Koreans who
enter China without documents as illegal economic migrants
without making any effort to determine whether or not they are
refugees, and claims that it must return them to the DPRK. In a
June 19, 2007, press conference Ministry of Foreign Affairs
press spokesperson Qin Gang repeated China's longstanding
insistence that these migrants ``came to China for economic
reasons and they are not `refugees' at all.'' \9\ In addition,
the Chinese government bases its policy of repatriating North
Koreans on a 1961 treaty with the DPRK and a series of
protocols on border management signed by the two countries in
1986 and 1998.\10\ But China is also obligated under Article 3
of the Convention Against Torture not to forcibly return any
person to another state where there are substantial grounds for
believing that he or she would be in danger of torture.\11\
Under the general international legal principle of non-
derogation, China's bilateral commitments with the DPRK should
not supersede China's international obligations under the 1951
Convention, its Protocol, and the Convention Against
Torture.\12\
Moreover, the treatment these refugees receive upon their
repatriation to the DPRK provides more than ample evidence that
they satisfy the definition of refugees under international
law. The 1951 Convention defines a refugee as someone who,
``owing to well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of
race, religion,
nationality, membership of a particular social group or
political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality
and is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail
himself of the protection of that country.'' \13\ In a 2005
report, the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in North
Korea noted that even North Koreans who have crossed into China
for reasons of livelihood are nevertheless ``refugees sur
place,'' a designation for those who ``did not leave their
country of origin for fear of persecution, but who fear
persecution upon return.'' \14\
The DPRK government imprisons, tortures, and executes
repatriated North Koreans, and has increased the punishment for
border crossers since late 2004. Article 233 of the amended
North Korean Penal Code provides for up to two years'
imprisonment for citizens who leave the DPRK without
permission, and Article 62 provides for no less than five
years' imprisonment for defectors, and life imprisonment or
execution for defectors deemed to have committed ``an extremely
grave offense.'' \15\ According to international NGOs, North
Koreans are considered to have committed a more serious
offense, and are punished more harshly, if they have converted
to Christianity or have met with Christian missionaries, South
Koreans, or other foreigners while in China.\16\ In late 2004,
the North Korean government changed its policy toward
repatriated border crossers to increase prison sentences from
several months to several years and to detain them in regular
prisons, which have harsher regimes, rather than labor
camps.\17\ Defector testimonies document cases of beatings,
forced labor, lack of food and medicine, degrading treatment,
torture, and execution.\18\ Pregnant female defectors have
reportedly been subjected to forced abortions under poor
medical care. According to a South Korean Bar Association
study, defectors have also reported witnessing North Korean
authorities carry out forced abortions.\19\
The Chinese government blanketly asserts that North Korean
migrants are not refugees, and does not permit individual
petitions for asylum. The government also denies the UN High
Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and other organizations the
access needed to evaluate their claims. Chinese guards posted
outside the UNHCR office and foreign embassies in Beijing block
access to North Koreans who seek to present refugee
petitions.\20\ The government's failure to allow for a process
in order to evaluate whether individual North Koreans have
reason to fear persecution upon return to the DPRK contravenes
its obligations under the 1951 Convention and its Protocol, as
identified by the U.S. Committee for Human Rights in North
Korea: ``Implicit in the Convention--the strict Article 33
prohibition read together with the multi-pronged Article 1
refugee definition--is a requirement that states take
appropriate steps to determine whether an individual is a
refugee before sending him or her back to possible
persecution.'' \21\ This refusal of access by the UNHCR also
contravenes Article 35 of the 1951 Convention.\22\
The government fines and imprisons Chinese citizens and
international humanitarian workers who assist North Korean
refugees, and these penalties have recently been increased. In
2006, Chinese authorities sentenced Hong Jin-hee, Kim Hong-
kyun, and Lee Soo-cheol, three South Korean citizens and former
North Korean defectors, to seven, five, and two years'
imprisonment, respectively, for assisting North Koreans in
China to seek asylum in a third country. Chinese authorities
detained Kim and Lee in Beijing in October 2004, and Hong in
Shenyang in November 2004, and have held the three without
trial until their sentencing in 2006.\23\ In November 2006,
authorities in Yantai city, Shandong province, released on
parole Choi Yong-hoon, a South Korean citizen imprisoned for
assisting North Koreans in China to seek asylum in South Korea,
after Choi served 3 years and 11 months of his 5-year
sentence.\24\
The Chinese government is reportedly in the final stages of
drafting a Regulation on the Administration of Refugees.\25\ A
June 2007 report in the official People's Daily said that ``the
government draft national refugee regulation [is] now in its
final phase,'' but that ``[i]t is unclear when the draft will
be submitted to the State Council for final review and
approval.'' The report also mentions the UNHCR role in
``helping . . . [to] draft'' the regulation.\26\ In March 2006,
the UNHCR said that his office would be involved in insuring
that the regulation is in compliance with international
law.\27\ The drafting process for these regulations provides
Chinese officials with an opportunity to carry out a long
overdue reassessment of their refugee policies to make them
accessible and transparent, providing every refugee with a
chance for a legal hearing and an appeal if necessary.
Freedom of Residence and Travel
FREEDOM OF RESIDENCE
The Chinese government continues to enforce the household
registration (hukou) system it first established in the 1950s.
This system limits the right of Chinese citizens to determine
their permanent place of residence. Regulations and policies
that condition legal rights and access to social services on
residency status have resulted in discrimination against rural
hukou holders who migrate for work to urban areas. The hukou
system exacerbates barriers that migrant workers and their
families face in areas such as employment, healthcare, property
rights, legal compensation, and schooling. [See Section II--
Worker Rights for more information.] Central and local
government reforms from the past five years have mitigated some
obstacles to equal treatment, but provisions that allow people
to change hukou status have included criteria that advantage
those with greater economic and educational resources or with
family connections to urban hukou holders.\1\ The government's
restrictions on residence and discrimination in equal treatment
contravene international human rights standards,\2\ including
those in treaties China has signed or ratified.\3\ In May 2005,
the UN Committee on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights
expressed ``deep concern'' over the discrimination resulting
from ``inter alia, the restrictive national household
registration system (hukou) which continues to be in place
despite official announcements regarding reforms.'' \4\
Recent reforms have addressed some of the burdens migrants
face. In 2001, the State Council expanded an earlier program to
allow rural migrants who meet set requirements to migrate to
small towns and cities and obtain hukou there, while keeping
rural land rights.\5\ In 2003, the State Council abolished
``Measures for the Custody and Repatriation of Vagrant Beggars
in Cities'' that allowed the police to detain, at will, people
without identification, residence, or work permits.\6\ The same
year, the State Council issued a national legal aid regulation
that does not condition legal aid on residence status.\7\
Central government directives promulgated in 2003 and
beyond also have called for reform, though many have had
limited formal legal force and limited impact.
<bullet> In 2003, the State Council issued a directive
acknowledging migrants' right to work in cities,
forbidding discriminatory policies, and calling for
improved services for migrants and their families.\8\
<bullet> Also in 2003, the State Council issued legal
guidance ordering urban governments to take
responsibility for educating migrant children.\9\
<bullet> A 2004 State Council directive called for an
end to discriminatory work restrictions against
migrants.\10\
<bullet> The Ministry of Labor and Social Services
(MOLSS) issued a labor handbook the following year
stating that the MOLSS will not require migrants to
obtain a work registration card in their place of
origin before seeking jobs in urban areas.\11\
<bullet> A joint opinion on the promotion of a ``new
socialist countryside'' issued in 2005 by the Communist
Party Central Committee and the State Council called
for reforms to the hukou system, including a
reiteration of prior reform measures that stalled at
the local level.\12\
<bullet> In 2006, the State Council issued an opinion
addressing various issues affecting migrant workers and
calling for measures to ease, under certain conditions,
migrants' ability to settle in urban areas.\13\
<bullet> 2006 revisions to the compulsory education law
codify a guarantee of equal educational opportunities
for children outside the jurisdiction of their hukou
registry.\14\
<bullet> During the 10th session of the National
People's Congress (NPC) in March 2007, Chinese
legislators approved a resolution creating a delegate
quota in the NPC reserved for migrant workers.\15\
<bullet> In 2007, the Ministry of Public Security
formulated a series of proposals to submit to the State
Council for approval.\16\ Major reforms in the proposal
include improving the temporary residence permit
system, improving the ability of migrants' spouses and
parents to transfer hukou to urban areas, and using the
existence of a fixed and legal place of residence as
the primary basis for obtaining registration in a city
of residence.\17\
Uneven implementation of hukou reform at the local level
has dulled the impact of national calls for change. Fiscal
burdens placed on local governments have served as
disincentives for implementing reforms. Fears of population
pressures and citizen activism, in addition to discriminatory
attitudes against migrants, also have fueled resistance from
local governments.\18\ Since 2001, many provinces and large
cities have implemented measures that allow migrants to obtain
an urban hukou, but they generally give preference to wealthier
and more educated migrants by conditioning change in status on
meeting requirements such as having ``a stable place of
residence'' and a ``stable source of income,'' as defined in
local provisions.\19\ New reforms instituted in Chengdu in 2006
allow some migrants to obtain a hukou where they rent housing
in the city and reside in it for over a year, but the reforms
also impose conditions that disadvantage poorer migrants.\20\
Other policies also are detrimental to broader reforms of the
hukou system. In 2005, authorities in Shenzhen implemented
tighter restrictions against migrants by suspending the
processing of hukou applications for migrants' dependents.
Authorities also said they would limit the growth of private
schools for migrant children and require migrant parents to pay
additional fees to enroll their children in public schools.\21\
In 2006, Shenyang municipal authorities reversed 2003
relaxations on hukou requirements when they reinstituted
temporary residence requirements for migrants.\22\
Some local government measures have been beneficial to
improving conditions for migrants. After the State Council
called in 2004 for abolishing employment restrictions for
migrants, the Beijing municipal government followed suit with
local reforms in 2005 that eliminated restrictions on migrant
workers holding certain occupations.\23\ In 2005, Henan
provincial authorities reported that they would institute
measures to increase migrant workers' access to healthcare
while in urban areas.\24\ In 2006, authorities in a district
within the city of Xi'an reported instituting measures granting
all residents equal access to social services.\25\ Some local
governments have removed discriminatory compensation levels for
rural migrants. In October 2006, the Chongqing High People's
Court issued an opinion stipulating that rural migrants who
have resided in Chongqing for over a year and have an
``appropriate source of
income'' are entitled to the same compensation as urban hukou
holders in traffic accident cases.\26\ The Supreme People's
Court is currently contemplating a new judicial interpretation
on the role of hukou status in determining death compensation
rates.\27\
Central and local governments have accompanied measures to
address discrimination against migrants with calls to
strengthen supervision over migrant populations, reflecting
concerns over
perceived social unrest. The 2003 directive articulating broad
protections for migrant workers also supports measures to
increase control over them, including through ``social order
management responsibility systems.'' \28\ Although a government
official called in 2005 for transforming management techniques
from methods of control to methods of service,\29\ authorities
have continued to enact measures to exert government control. A
circular from Henan province issued in 2006 called for
monitoring migrants by keeping files on their rental
housing.\30\
FREEDOM OF TRAVEL
The Chinese government continues to enforce restrictions on
citizens' right to travel, in violation of international human
rights standards.\31\ The Law on Passports, effective January
2007, articulates some beneficial features for passport
applicants, but gives officials the discretion to refuse a
passport where ``[t]he competent organs of the State Council
believe that [the applicant's] leaving China will do harm to
the state security or result in serious losses to the benefits
of the state.'' \32\ Authorities restrict travel to penalize
citizens who express views they deem objectionable. The Chinese
government initially failed to approve democracy activist Yang
Jianli's passport application,\33\ which he submitted after his
release from prison in April 2007.\34\ In August, however,
authorities
allowed Yang to travel to the United States. Authorities had
detained Yang in 2002 when he crossed into China on another
person's passport. Authorities had earlier refused to renew his
passport and had barred him and other activists from entering
the country.\35\ Chinese officials have prevented other
activists from traveling abroad, including rights defender Tang
Jingling, whose passport was confiscated by Guangdong border
authorities in September 2006 as he was en route to New York.
Tang brought an administrative lawsuit against the government
in December 2006.\36\ In February 2007, the government
prevented a group of writers from participating in a conference
in Hong Kong by denying visas to some writers, warning others
not to attend, and directly preventing some from passing
through border controls into Hong Kong.\37\ [See Section II--
Freedom of Expression for more information.] In June 2007,
authorities intercepted human rights defenders Yao Lifa and
Zeng Jinyan at the airport and prevented them from traveling to
an overseas human rights conference.\38\ In July,
authorities rejected Mongol rights advocate Gao Yulian's
passport application on the grounds of ``possible harm to state
security and national interests.'' \39\ In August, Shanghai
authorities denied the passport applications of rights defense
lawyer and former political prisoner Zheng Enchong and his
spouse Jiang Meili.\40\ The same month, authorities in Beijing
prevented Yuan Weijing, spouse of imprisoned rights activist
Chen Guangcheng, from traveling overseas to accept an award for
her husband.\41\ In 2007, authorities also denied passport
applications from the family members of defense lawyer Gao
Zhisheng.\42\
The government also uses travel restrictions to control
religious citizens' overseas travel and to punish religious
adherents deemed to act outside approved parameters. [See
Section II--Freedom of Religion for more information.] The
central government has increased control over Muslims' ability
to undertake overseas religious pilgrimages, especially since
2004. In June 2007, overseas media reported that authorities in
the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region (XUAR) implemented a
policy to confiscate passports from Muslims, and Uighurs in
particular, in a reported effort to enforce restrictions on
overseas pilgrimages.\43\ In July, the XUAR government
announced the public security bureau would strengthen passport
controls as part of its campaign to curb unauthorized
pilgrimages.\44\ House church leader Zhang Rongliang, who
resorted to obtaining illegal travel documents after the
government refused to issue him a passport, was sentenced to
seven and one-half years' imprisonment in 2006 on charges of
illegally crossing the border and fraudulently obtaining a
passport.\45\ Also in 2006, authorities detained two leaders of
the unregistered Wenzhou diocese, Peter Shao Zhumin and Paul
Jiang Surang, after they returned from a pilgrimage to Rome.
Six months after their detention, Shao and Jiang received
prison sentences of 9 and 11 months, respectively, after
authorities accused them of falsifying their passports and
charged them with illegal exit from the country.\46\
Authorities placed house church historian and former political
prisoner Zhang Yinan and his family under surveillance in 2006
after he tried to apply for a passport to attend a religious
function in the United States.\47\
Endnotes
Notes to Section II--Status of Women
\1\ CECC, 2003 Annual Report, 2 October 03, 47.
\2\ Ibid., 47-49; CECC, 2004 Annual Report, 5 October 04, 56-57;
CECC, 2006 Annual Report, 20 September 06, 97-98.
\3\ CECC, 2004 Annual Report, 55-56; CECC, 2005 Annual Report, 11
October 05, 67, 69; CECC, 2006 Annual Report, 99.
\4\ CECC, 2004 Annual Report, 56-58; CECC, 2005 Annual Report, 67-
68; CECC, 2006 Annual Report, 97-99.
\5\ CECC, 2005 Annual Report, 67; CECC, 2006 Annual Report, 97-98.
\6\ PRC Constitution, art. 48. Article 48 declares that women are
equal to men and names women as a ``vulnerable social group'' requiring
special protection.
\7\ The State Council Women's Development Program, 2001-2010
[Zhongguo funu fazhan gangyao, 2001-2010], May 2001.
\8\ PRC Law on the Protection of Women's Rights and Interests,
enacted 3 April 92, amended 28 August 05; CECC, 2005 Annual Report, 67-
68.
\9\ These include Liaoning province (2006), Heilongjiang province
(2006), Jiangxi province (2006), Hunan province (2006), Shaanxi
province (2006), Xinjiang province (2006), Wenzhou municipality (2006),
Shanghai municipality (2007), and Guangdong province (2007), among
others. See ``Wenzhou City Issues New Domestic Violence Provisions,''
CECC China Human Rights and Rule of Law Update, December 2006, 16-17;
``Regarding the Amended Shanghai Law on the Protection of Women's
Rights and Interests Implementing Measures,'' People's Daily (Online),
11 May 07; Xulin and Sun Xiaosu, ``Married-out Women in Guangdong
Province Gain Hope,'' China Women's News, reprinted in Women Watch--
China (Online), 7 June 07.
\10\ ``Regarding the Amended Shanghai Law on the Protection of
Women's Rights and Interests Implementing Measures,'' People's Daily.
\11\ CECC, 2002-2004 Annual Reports.
\12\ CECC Staff Interview; ``Wenzhou City Issues New Domestic
Violence Provisions,'' CECC China Human Rights and Rule of Law Update,
16-17; ``System of Laws and Policies Protecting Women Take a Step
Closer Toward Completion'' [Fu bao falu zhengce tixi jinyibu wanshan],
Legal Daily (Online), 29 January 07; ``Regarding the Amended Shanghai
Law on the Protection of Women's Rights and Interests Implementing
Measures,'' People's Daily; Wang Zhuqiong, ``New Move To Stem Domestic
Violence,'' China Daily (Online), 21 July 07.
\13\ Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women,
Concluding Comments of the Committee on the Elimination of
Discrimination Against Women, Advanced Unedited Version, Thirty-sixth
session, 7-25 August 06.
\14\ PRC Marriage Law, enacted 10 September 80, amended 28 April
01, art 3; PRC Law on the Protection of Women's Rights and Interests,
art. 46; ``Same Domestic Violence Accusation, Different Results in
Shanghai and Baotou Court Cases; Expert Calls for Unified Standard''
[Tongshi shou nuesha fu Shanghai Baotou pan butong zhuanjia: tongyi
biaozhun], Legal Daily (Online), 30 March 06; Human Rights in China
(Online), ``Implementation of the Convention of the Elimination of All
Forms of Discrimination Against Women in the People's Republic of
China, A Parallel NGO Report,'' June 2006.
\15\ For example, with regards to domestic violence survivors
bearing the burden in bringing complaints, see the PRC Marriage Law,
arts. 43, 45.
\16\ ``Domestic Violence in Spotlight,'' China Daily (Online), 2
August 07; ``Survey of Young Female Migrant Workers Reveals 70 Percent
Have Been Sexually Harassed'' [Hunan nianqing nuxing nongmingong
diaocha 7 cheng dagongmei zaoguo xingsaorao], Xinhua (Online), 15 May
06.
\17\ CECC, 2003 Annual Report, 47-48.
\18\ Ibid., 48.
\19\ Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women,
Concluding Comments of the Committee on the Elimination of
Discrimination Against Women, 4.
\20\ CECC, 2006 Annual Report, 99.
\21\ CECC, 2004 Annual Report, 56.
\22\ ``Women Contribute to over 40% GDP,'' China News, reprinted in
All-China Women's Federation (Online), 17 May 07.
\23\ Guo Aibing, ``More Women Fill Top Posts, but Still Wield
Little Authority,'' South China Morning Post (Online), 16 May 07;
``Women Contribute to over 40% GDP,'' China News; ``Minimum Hiring Rate
for Women Employees Must Be 30%'' [Luyong gongwuyuan nuxingbili bude
diyu 30%], China Women's News (Online), 15 January 07.
\24\ ``Chengdu Imposes Gender Quota on Local Government's Leading
Positions'' [Chengdu guiding quxian si da banxi zhishao ge you yi ming
nu ganbu], Eastday Net (Online), 7 November 06; Standing Committee of
Heilongjiang People's Congress, ``Law Guaranteeing Gender Ratio of
Heilongjiang People's Congress, Implementing Women's Law, Appears''
[Renda nu daibiao bili tigao dao 30% funu quanyi baozhang fa shishi
banfa chutai], 31 October 06; ``Funds for Women's Development Work are
No Lower than 0.3 yuan Per Person'' [Funu gongzuo jingfei meiren mei
nian bu diyu 0.3 yuan], China Women's News (Online), 31 October 06.
\25\ CECC, 2005 Annual Report, 69-70.
\26\ Specifically, women accounted for 27.8 percent of all reported
HIV/AIDS cases in 2006, an increase from 19.4 percent in 2000. ``More
than a Quarter of AIDS Patients in China are Women,'' Xinhua, reprinted
in Women of China (Online), 5 June 07.
\27\ ``Report: Unsafe Sex Major Cause of HIV Infection,'' China
Daily (Online), 20 August 07.
\28\ CECC, 2003 Annual Report, 49.
\29\ ``China's Suicide Rate Among World's Highest,'' China Daily
(Online), 11 September 07; Christopher Allen, ``Traditions Weigh on
China's Women,'' BBC (Online), 20 June 06; World Health Organization,
``Suicide Huge but Preventable Public Health Problem,'' 10 September
04; Maureen Fan, ``In Rural China, a Bitter Way out,'' Washington Post
(Online), 15 May 07.
\30\ ``Domestic Violence is the Main Reason Chinese Rural Women
Commit Suicide'' [Jiating baoli shi daozhi zhongguo nongcun funu zisha
de zhuyin], Radio Free Asia (Online), 28 November 06; CECC, 2006 Annual
Report, 99; Fan, ``In Rural China, a Bitter Way out.''
\31\ Over the period from 1991 to 2004, ``national statistics
show[ed] an overall decline in maternal mortality from 80 to 48.3
deaths per 100,000 live births.'' There is a divide between urban and
rural areas, however, as the maternal mortality rate in small and
medium cities had declined to 15.3 deaths per 100,000 live births by
2004, compared to 96 deaths per 100,000 in remote rural areas. The gap
has widened since 1996. China Development Brief (Online), ``Drop in
Maternal and Child Mortality Slow and Uneven,'' 18 January 07.
\32\ Human Rights in China, ``Implementation of the Convention of
the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women in the
People's Republic of China,'' 15.
\33\ A 2005 report by China Children's Center reported 99.14
percent enrollment rates for girls, and 99.16 percent enrollment rates
for boys. ``Girls and Boys have Basically the Same Rate of Entry into
School,'' Xinhua (Online), 9 December 06. See also, China Statistical
Yearbook 2006, Figure 21-5 titled ``Number of New Students Enrollment
by Level and Type of School.''
\34\ ``China Still Has 100 Million Illiterate People; Of that, 70%
are Women'' [Wuguo haiyou wenmang 1 yi duo qizhong nuxing yu qicheng],
People's Daily (Online), 17 October 06; The State Council Women's
Development Program, 2001-2010.
\35\ ``Spring Bud Program Helps 2622 Girls Stay in School over 11
Years in Ningxia'' [``Chunlei nainai'' jianglijuan: 11 nian zizhu 2622
ming shixue nutong], Xinhua (Online), 14 November 06; ```Spring Bud
Program' Helps 1,600,000 Girls Return to School'' [``Chunlei jihua''
bang 160 wan nutong chongfan xiaoyuan], China Women's News (Online), 18
October 06.
\36\ Xulin and Sun Xiaosu, ``Married-out Women in Guangdong
Province Gain Hope.''
\37\ Ibid.; ``Women Sue Village Committees for Denying Them Land
Rights,'' CECC China Human Rights and Rule of Law Update, July 2006, 8.
\38\ Xulin and Sun Xiaosu, ``Married-out Women in Guangdong
Province Gain Hope.''
\39\ Ibid.
\40\ PRC Organic Law of Village Committees, enacted 4 November 98,
art. 20. Article 20 states that ``no villagers charter of self-
government, rules and regulations for the village, villagers pledges or
matters decided through discussions by a villagers assembly or by
representatives of villagers may contravene the Constitution, laws,
regulations, or State policies, or contain such contents as infringing
upon villagers rights of the person, their democratic rights or lawful
property rights.''
\41\ Xulin and Sun Xiaosu, ``Married-out Women in Guangdong
Province Gain Hope.''
\42\ Ibid.
\43\ Ibid.
\44\ CECC Staff Interview; Xu Yushan, ``A Preliminary Analysis of
the Relationship between the Women's Federation and Other Women's
Organizations'' [Qianxi fulian yu qita funuzuzhi de guanxi], Collection
of Women's Studies [Funu yanjiu luncong], No. 2, March 2004, 44-48.
\45\ China Women's University established a legal center for women
and children in September 2006 that offers free legal services
primarily to women and children, but also to other ``vulnerable
groups'' such as the elderly and the disabled. Legal services include
counseling over the telephone, counseling in person, drafting documents
on behalf of someone else, mediation, and litigation. ``China Women's
University Establishes Legal Center for Women and Children'' [Zhonghua
nuzi xueyuan chengli funu ertong falu fuwu zhongxin], China Women's
News, reprinted in Women Watch--China (Online), 26 September 06. In
September 2006, the Beijing Lawyers Association Marriage and Family
Special Committee held a seminar that focused on legal protections of
women's land rights, seminars are held to brainstorm questions and
raise suggestions to the Legislation Department, regarding the land
rights and interests of women, especially married-out women, divorced
women, and widows. ``Seminar on Legal Protection of Women's Land
Rights'' [Tudi yong yi quan falu shiwu wenti yantaohui], Women Watch--
China (Online), 1 October 06.
\46\ CECC, 2006 Annual Report, 98.
\47\ Ibid., 98.
\48\ CECC, 2005 Annual Report, 72.
\49\ ``Chinese Villages Have Roughly 47 Million `Left Behind
Women''' [Zhongguo nongcun ``liushou funu'' yue 4700 wan], Radio Free
Asia (Online), 8 November 06.
\50\ ``Older Pregnant Woman Unexpectedly Dismissed by Company''
[Gaoling bailing huaiyun jing bei gongsi jiegu], New Express, reprinted
in Women Watch--China (Online), 3 November 06.
\51\ The survey data was collected from 6,595 questionnaires handed
out in 416 villages and four cities. ``Female Migrants Suffering at
Work,'' China Daily, 30 November 06 (Open Source Center, 30 November
06).
\52\ Liu Yun and Yao Jian, ``Legal Aid for Female Migrant
Workers,'' China Women's News, reprinted in Women Watch--China
(Online), 21 June 07.
\53\ Ibid.
\54\ ``Over 60 Million Female Workers Have Maternity Insurance,''
Women of China (Online), 21 June 07. The Yunnan Provincial Health
Bureau launched a project to raise public awareness of HIV/AIDS, with
the aim of educating 80 percent of its female population. ``Project
Launched To Protect Women from AIDS,'' China News (Online), 13 July 07.
Some local governments have established programs to provide loans and
training to women who have lost their jobs. Liu Yun and Yao Jian,
``Legal Aid for Female Migrant Workers.''
\55\ ``Why Can't Women Retire at the Same Age as Men'' [Nuren
pingsha wuquan yu nanren tongling tuixiu], Southern Weekend (Online),
13 October 05.
\56\ ``Why Can't Women Retire at the Same Age as Men,'' Southern
Weekend; CECC, 2005 Annual Report, 67.
\57\ ``Hubei Transportation Company: Female Attendants Whose Weight
Exceeds 60 Kilograms Must Step Down'' [Nu chengwuyuan tizhong chaoguo
60 gongjin jiang xiagang], Radio Free Asia (Online), 7 October 06.
\58\ China Gender Equality and Women's Development Report [Zhongguo
xingbie pingdeng yu funu fazhan baogao], ed. Tan Lin (Beijing: Social
Sciences Academic Press, 2006), reprinted in China Net (Online).
Notes to Section II--Population Planning
\1\ CECC, 2006 Annual Report, 20 September 06, 109.
\2\ The population increased by roughly 300 million from 1980 to
2005. Statistic cited in Tyrene White, China's Longest Campaign: Birth
Planning in the People's Republic, 1949-2005 (Ithaca: Cornell UP,
2006), 263. For official Chinese government information on its
population planning policies see State Council Information Office,
White Paper on Population in China, 19 December 00. For information on
the number of births prevented, see paragraph 7 of the report.
\3\ Quoted in White, China's Longest Campaign, 238.
\4\ Central Committee of the CCP and State Council Decision
Regarding the Comprehensive Strengthening of Population and Family
Planning Work To Resolve the Population Problem as a Whole [Zhonggong
zhongyang guowuyuan guanyu quanmian jiaqiang renkou he jihua shengyu
gongzuo tongchou jiejue renkou wenti de jueding], issued 17 December
06.
\5\ Guan Xiaofeng, ``Official: Family Planning Policy To Stay,''
China Daily, reprinted on the National Population and Family Planning
Commission of China Web site, 4 July 07.
\6\ The circumstances under which women may bear a second child are
governed by provincial-level regulations. Provincial regulations have
allowed additional children for ethnic minorities and some rural Han
Chinese residents and permitted second births where the first child is
a girl, is disabled, or, in some cases, where both parents are only
children themselves, among other circumstances. For basic codification
of the one-child policy, see Population and Family Planning Law of the
People's Republic of China (Population and Family Planning Law),
adopted 29 December 01, art. 18. For examples of restrictions in local
regulations, see, e.g., Henan Province Population and Family Planning
Regulation [Henansheng renkou yu jihua shengyu tiaoli], adopted 30
November 02, art. 15, 17, 18; Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region (XUAR)
Regulation on Population and Family Planning [Xinjiang weiwu'er zizhiqu
renkou yu jihua shengyu tiaoli], art. 15. Article 15 of the Henan
province regulation ``advocates that a couple give birth to one child,
strictly controls the birth of a second child, and prohibits the birth
of a third child.'' Articles 17 and 18 stipulate conditions under which
couples may apply for approval to have a second child, such as where a
first child carries a genetic disability. Article 15 of the XUAR
regulation allows urban Han Chinese couples to have one child, urban
ethnic minority couples and rural Han Chinese couples to have two, and
rural ethnic minority couples to have three. See also Gu Baochang et
al., ``China's Local and National Fertility Policies at the End of the
Twentieth Century,'' Population and Development Review 33(1), March
2007, 132-136. Government officials have attempted to downplay controls
by stating that a strict one-child rule affects less than 36 percent of
the population. See, e.g., ``Many Free To Have More Than One Child,''
Xinhua (Online), 11 July 07.
\7\ Population and Family Planning Law, art. 41. Each provincial-
level government determines its own fees. Measures for Collection of
Social Compensation Fees [Shehui fuyangfei zhengshou guanli banfa],
issued 2 September 02, art. 3, 7. In Beijing, parents who have children
in violation of the local regulation, including unmarried women who are
in violation by giving birth to a child, face fines that range from 3
to 10 times the area's average income. Beijing Measures for Managing
the Collection of Social Compensation Fees [Beijing shi shehui
fuyangfei zhengshou guanli banfa], adopted 5 November 02, art. 5. Fees
are lower in Shandong province, where the fine is set at 30 percent of
local incomes. Shandong Province Measures for Managing the Collection
of Birth Control Social Compensation Fees [Shandongsheng jihua shengyu
shehui fuyangfei zhengshou guanli banfa], issued 1998, art. 4.
\8\ Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, U.S. Department
of State, Country Reports on Human Rights Practices--2006, China
(includes Tibet, Hong Kong, and Macau) (Online), 6 March 07.
\9\ Under Article 41 of the Population and Family Planning Law,
where a citizen does not pay the social compensation fee, ``the
administrative department for family planning that makes the decision
on collection of the fees shall, in accordance with law, apply to the
People's Court for enforcement.'' Population and Family Planning Law,
art. 41. U.S. Department of State, Country Reports on Human Rights
Practices--2006; CECC Staff Interview.
\10\ See, e.g., ``Family Planning Faces Challenge from New Rich,''
Xinhua, reprinted in China Daily (Online), 14 December 05. Officials
have said the government will take measures to discourage wealthier
citizens from violating restrictions. Alice Yan and Kristine Kwok,
``One-Child Crackdown Looms for Elite; Officials Consider Stiffer
Penalties for Rich and Famous Who Flout Family Policy,'' South China
Morning Post (Online), 1 March 07.
\11\ ``2,000 Officials Breach `One-Child' Policy in Hunan,'' China
Daily, reprinted on China Elections and Governance Web site, 9 July 07.
The Hunan government amended local regulations on population planning
in September to increase fines for violating the regulations. ``Chinese
Province Raises Fines on Wealthy Flouters of Family Planning Laws,''
Xinhua, 29 September 07 (Open Source Center, 29 September 07).
\12\ ``Chinese Officials Breaching One-Child Policy Denied
Promotion,'' Xinhua, 14 September 07 (Open Source Center, 14 September
07).
\13\ See, e.g., ``State Population and Family Planning Commission
Indicates `Encouraging and Rewarding Fewer Births' To Be Carried Out at
Least 20-30 Years'' [Guojia renkou jishengwei biaoshi ``jiangli
shaosheng'' zhishao zhixing er san shinian], People's Daily (Online),
19 October 06; ``Encouragement and Reward Assistance System To Enter
Implementation Phase'' [Jiangli fuzhu zhidu jiang jinru shishi
jieduan], People's Daily (Online), 16 October 06. Yang Jie,
``Autonomous Region Launches Important Reform on General College
Entrance Examination,'' Xinjiang Daily, 31 May 07 (Open Source Center,
12 June 07).
\14\ National Population and Family Planning Commission Circular on
Printing and Distributing Action Plan for Special Rectification of
Unlawful Births in Cities and Towns [Guojia renkou jishengwei guanyu
yinfa chengzhen weifa shengyu zhuanxiang zhili xingdong fang'an de
tongzhi], issued 24 May 07. For an English translation, see ``China:
Action Plan To Rectify Unlawful Births in Urban Areas,'' Open Source
Center, 16 June 07.
\15\ Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination
Against Women, adopted and opened for signature, ratification, and
accession by General Assembly resolution 34/180 of 18 December 79,
entry into force 3 September 81, art. 2, 3, 16(1)(e).
\16\ Convention on the Rights of the Child, adopted and opened for
signature, ratification, and accession by General Assembly resolution
44/25 of 20 November 89, entry into force 2 September 90, art. 2, 3, 4,
6, 26. China has submitted a reservation to Article 6: ``[T]he People's
Republic of China shall fulfil its obligations provided by article 6 of
the Convention under the prerequisite that the Convention accords with
the provisions of article 25 concerning family planning of the
Constitution of the People's Republic of China and in conformity with
the provisions of article 2 of the Law of Minor Children of the
People's Republic of China.'' Office of the UN High Commissioner for
Human Rights, ``Declarations and reservations to the Convention on the
Rights of the Child'' (Online).
\17\ International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural
Rights (ICESCR) adopted by General Assembly resolution 2200 A (XXI) of
16 December 66, entry into force 3 January 76, art. 10(3).
\18\ Population and Family Planning Law, art. 39.
\19\ See, e.g., ``7,000 Forcibly Sterilised in Eastern China,''
South China Morning Post (Online), 12 September 05; Joseph Kahn,
``Advocate for China's Weak Crosses the Powerful,'' New York Times, 20
July 06. For Chinese reporting on events in Linyi, see, e.g.,
``Officials Fired for Forced Abortions,'' Xinhua (Online), 21 September
05; ``PRC Official Confirms Irregularities in Shandong Family Planning
Management,'' Xinhua, 19 September 05 (Open Source Center, 26 September
05).
\20\ See the CECC Political Prisoner Database for more information
on Chen Guangcheng.
\21\ See, e.g., ``Guangxi Town `Tense' After One-Child Protest Put
Down,'' South China Morning Post (Online), 22 May 07; Joseph Kahn,
``Birth Control Measures Prompt Riots in China,'' New York Times
(Online), 21 May 07; ``Government Uses Iron Fist To Force Sterilization
of Female Student'' [Zhengfu tiewan bi nusheng jueyu], Ming Pao
(Online), 22 May 07.
\22\ See, e.g., Chow Chung-yan, ``One-Child Policy Riots Flare Up--
Anger Over Birth-Control Fines Spreads across Guangxi,'' South China
Morning Post (Online), 31 May 07; ``10,000 Riot in Guangxi,'' Tung Fang
Jih Pao, 21 May 07 (Open Source Center, 21 May 07); ``Guangxi Family
Planning Protests Erupt Again in Rong County,'' Radio Free Asia
(Online), 29 May 07. In July, state-controlled media reported that two
men received prisons sentences of one and two years for their
involvement in the protests. ``China Jails Two Men for Birth-Control
Riots,'' Reuters (Online), 23 July 07.
\23\ ``Full-Term Abortion Lawsuit a First for China,'' Caijing
(Online), 25 July 07.
\24\ The pressures created by population planning policies,
combined with entrenched preferences for male children and under-
reporting of female births, have factored into estimates of China's
unbalanced sex ratio. See White, China's Longest Campaign, 203-207, for
more information on sex ratios in China and in other countries with
traditional preferences for boys.
\25\ ``New Policy Will Offer Cash Instead of Kids,'' China Daily
(Online), 16 October 06.
\26\ Decision Regarding the Comprehensive Strengthening of
Population and Family Planning Work To Resolve the Population Problem
as a Whole. Article 35 of the 2002 Population and Family Planning Law
prohibits, but does not penalize, sex-selective abortion. Population
and Family Planning Law, art. 35.
\27\ Statistics cited in U.S. Department of State, ``Country
Reports on Human Rights Practices--2006. There is some variation in
reporting on the sex ratio. See the CECC, 2006 Annual Report, 230
(footnote 34) for an overview of estimates during and before 2006.
\28\ ``Abortion Law Amendment To Be Abolished,'' China Daily,
reprinted in Xinhua, 26 June 06.
\29\ Henan Province Regulation on Prohibiting Non-Medically
Necessary Fetal Sex Determination and Sex-Selective Abortion
[Henansheng jinzhi feiyixue xuyao tai'er xingbie jianding he xuenze
xingbie rengong zhongzhi renshen tiaoli], issued 29 September 06. The
regulation only allows sex determination for cases in which medical
personnel suspect the existence of a congenital disease. For women who
have abided by all population planning requirements and are more than
14 weeks pregnant, abortion is permitted only when a serious hereditary
disease or severe birth defect is detected; if continuation of
gestation will damage the health or life of the pregnant woman; or if
the pregnant woman is divorced or widowed. The regulation does not
alter the legal framework for abortion prior to 14 weeks of gestation
or for women whose pregnancy violates population planning requirements.
The regulation also prohibits the retail sale of abortion-inducing
drugs, limits manufacturers' ability to distribute such
pharmaceuticals, and requires a physician to administer these drugs.
Penalties include fines of up to 2,000 yuan (US$260) for women who have
abortions in violation of the regulation's parameters, and fines of up
to 30,000 yuan (US$3,870) and possible revocation of licenses for
health organizations that do not comply with the new regulation.
\30\ For an overview of such measures, known as a ``1.5-children
policy,'' see Gu, ``China's Local and National Fertility Policies at
the End of the Twentieth Century,'' 133, 138.
\31\ Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, U.S.
Department of State, Trafficking in Persons Report--China, 12 June 07.
\32\ ``Xinjiang Focuses on Reducing Births in Minority Areas To
Curb Population Growth,'' CECC China Human Rights and Rule of Law
Update, April 2006, 15-16; ``Xinjiang Reports High Rate of Population
Increase,'' CECC China Human Rights and Rule of Law Update, March 2006,
16-17. A 1953 government census found that Han Chinese constituted 6
percent of the XUAR's population of 4.87 million, while Uighurs made up
75 percent. The 2000 census listed the Han population at 40.57 percent
and Uighurs at 45.21 percent of a total population of 18.46 million.
Demographer Stanley Toops has noted that Han migration since the 1950s
is responsible for the ``bulk'' of the XUAR's high population growth in
the past half century. Stanley Toops, ``Demographics and Development in
Xinjiang after 1949,''East-West Center Washington Working Papers No. 1,
May 04, 1.
Notes to Section II--Health
\1\ Beijing Municipality Regulations on Mental Health [Beijing shi
jingshen weisheng tiaoli], issued 8 December 06. According to a 2002
Human Rights Watch report, while an international delegation visited
Beijing in 1993 as part of China's bid for the 2000 Olympics,
individuals with mental illnesses were removed from the streets and
housed in temporary holding centers. Human Rights Watch (Online),
``Dangerous Minds, Political Psychiatry in China Today and its Origins
in the Mao Era,'' August 2002.
\2\ Beijing Municipality Regulations on Mental Health, art. 31.
\3\ G.A. Res. 119, U.N. GAOR, 46th Sess., Supp. No. 49, Annex, at
188-192, U.N. Doc. A/46/49 (1991). The General Assembly approved this
resolution without a vote on December 17, 1991. The resolution is not
binding and it is unclear whether China supported it. Beijing's mental
health regulations, however, include a number of provisions that are
similar to those found in the Principles, suggesting that officials
modeled their provisions in part on the Principles.
\4\ Beijing Municipality Regulations on Mental Health, arts. 27,
32.
\5\ ``Progress in AIDS Battle despite Harassment,'' Reuters,
reprinted in South China Morning Post (Online), 18 July 07.
\6\ Ibid.
\7\ The Center for Strategic and International Studies, ``Averting
a Full-Blown HIV/AIDS Epidemic in China: A Report of the CSIS HIV/AIDS
Delegation in China, 13-17 January 2003,'' February 2003, 2; United
Nations Theme Group of HIV/AIDS in China, ``HIV/AIDS: China's Titanic
Peril-2001 Update of the AIDS Situation and Needs Assessment Report,''
June 2002, 7.
\8\ The Center for Strategic and International Studies,
``Demography of HIV/AIDS in China: A Report of the Task Force on HIV/
AIDS,'' July 2007, 10.
\9\ ``Progress in AIDS Battle despite Harassment,'' Reuters.
\10\ ``China reports leap in new HIV/AIDS cases,'' Reuters
(Online), 9 September 07.
\11\ ``New Estimate in China Finds Fewer AIDS Cases,'' New York
Times (Online), 26 January 06.
\12\ ``Progress in AIDS Battle despite Harassment,'' Reuters;
``UNAIDS Chief Sees Signs of Progress in China,'' Reuters, reprinted in
Yahoo! (Online), 17 July 07.
\13\ Evelyn Iritani, ``China's AIDS Battle Goes Corporate,'' Los
Angeles Times (Online), 3 March 07.
\14\ Ibid.
\15\ Ibid.
\16\ Ben Blanchard, ``China Not Investing Enough To Fight AIDS:
Experts,'' Reuters, 5 April 07. As Thomas Cai, founder of AIDS Care
China, notes: ``Initial progress was made in Beijing because people in
the ministries were working with U.N. people and the international
community. When you get down to the lower level, people still have a
different mind-set.'' Iritani, ``China's AIDS Battle Goes Corporate.''
\17\ ``Hundreds of Police Storm `AIDS Village' in China, Arrest 13
Farmers,'' Agence France-Presse (Online), 3 July 03.
\18\ Chan Siu-sin, ``Four Residents of Henan AIDS Village
Obstructed from Petitioning Beijing,'' South China Morning Post
(Online), 4 July 04.
\19\ Human Rights Watch, Restrictions on AIDS Activists in China,
June 2005, 19; International Federation for Human Rights, Alternative
Report to the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights: China:
`At a Critical Stage,' Violations of the Right to Health in the Context
of the Fight against AIDS, April 2005.
\20\ ``AIDS Activist Resigns from Civil Society Organization, Cites
Government Pressure,'' CECC China Human Rights and Rule of Law Update,
March 2006, 7-8; ``Progress in AIDS Battle despite Harassment,''
Reuters.
\21\ ``Beijing PSB Officials Hold AIDS Activist Wan Yanhai, Cancel
AIDS Conference,'' CECC China Human Rights and Rule of Law Update,
December 2006, 8-9.
\22\ Jim Yardley, ``Detained AIDS Doctor Allowed To Visit U.S.
Later, China Says,'' New York Times (Online), 17 February 07.
\23\ Ibid.
\24\ Minnie Chan, ``Blood Centre Boss Fired, Six Jailed over
Illegal Sales,'' South China Morning Post (Online), 11 July 07.
\25\ Shan Juan, ``Blood Collections To Be Videotaped,'' China Daily
(Online), 11 July 07.
\26\ Dune Lawrence, ``China's Lack of HIV/AIDS Awareness Undermines
Control Program,'' Bloomberg (Online), 9 April 07. In addition, an
UNAIDS report released in March 2006 found that China was only half way
to meeting its goal under the UN's ``3 by 5'' initiative of providing
30,000 HIV/AIDS carriers access to anti-HIV/AIDS drugs by the end of
2005. World Health Organization and UNAIDS, ``Progress on Global Access
to HIV Antiretroviral Therapy: A Report on 3 by 5 and Beyond,'' 28
March 06, 72; CECC, 2006 Annual Report, 20 September 06, 111.
\27\ ``Number of Tibetans with HIV/AIDS Rising'' [Xizang HIV/AIDS
renshu shangsheng], Radio Free Asia (Online), 17 June 07; Bill
Savadove, ``140,000 Orphaned by AIDS, Says UNICEF,'' South China
Morning Post (Online), 9 July 07.
\28\ Iritani, ``China's AIDS Battle Goes Corporate.''
\29\ Lawrence, ``China's Lack of HIV/AIDS Awareness Undermines
Control Program;'' ``Discrimination against HIV Patients Still Rife,''
Xinhua, reprinted in China.org (Online), 29 November 06.
\30\ ``5-Year-old AIDS Patient Denied Surgery by Guangdong
Hospitals'' [Aizi nantong qiuyi zaoju] Southern Metropolitan Daily
(Online), 25 June 07; Chinese Human Rights Defenders (Online),
``Minquan County AIDS Patients Encounter Unfair Treatment at Police
Station'' [Minquan aizibing ren zaodao paichusuo de bugong daiyu], 5
July 07.
\31\ ``Doctors Not Up to Scratch on Hepatitis,'' China Daily
(Online), 29 September 05; Bonny Ling and Wing Lam, ``Hepatitis B: A
Catalyst for Anti-Discrimination Reforms?,'' 2 China Rights Forum 67,
68 (2007).
\32\ Ministry of Health (Online), ``Ministry of Health Publishes
`2006-2010 Plan on Hepatitis B Prevention and Control''' [``2006-2010
nian quanguo yi xing bingduxing ganyan fangzhi guihua'' fabu], 13
February 06.
\33\ CECC, 2004 Annual Report, 5 October 04, 65.
\34\ ``Law To Protect HB Virus Carriers,'' China Daily (Online), 24
August 04.
\35\ ``Plaintiff Wins Nominally in the First Hepatitis B
Discrimination Lawsuit'' [`Yigan qishi diyian' yuangao mingyi shang
huosheng], Beijing Youth Daily (Online), 3 April 04.
\36\ PRC Law on the Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases,
enacted 29 February 89, amended 28 August 04; CECC, 2004 Annual Report,
61.
\37\ Zhang Feng, ``HBV Victims Face Improved Job Chances,'' China
Daily (Online), 19 January 05; ``Public Opinion Defeats HBV
Discrimination,'' China Internet Information Center (Online), 23
September 04.
\38\ Vivien Cui, ``Hepatitis B Carriers Forced To Suffer in
Silence,'' South China Morning Post (Online), 5 September 06;
``Xinjiang Hepatitis Students Fight School Ban,'' Radio Free Asia
(Online), 20 November 06.
\39\ ``Doctors Not Up to Scratch on Hepatitis,'' China Daily.
\40\ China Development Brief (Online), ``Hepatitis Foundation
Learns from AIDS Activism,'' 16 February 06.
\41\ Ibid.; ``Xinjiang First Hepatitis B Discrimination Case
Docketed, Incoming Student Sues Xinjiang Agricultural University
[Xinjiang shou li yigan qishi an lian xiuxue xinsheng zhuanggao nongye
daxue],'' City Consumer Morning News (Online), 29 January 06.
\42\ China Development Brief (Online), ``Hepatitis B Stigma
Provokes Outcry in Xinjiang,'' 30 October 06; ``Xinjiang First
Hepatitis B Discrimination Case Docketed, Incoming Student Sues
Xinjiang Agricultural University,'' City Consumer Morning News.
\43\ ``December 16, Friday, Plaintiff in First Hepatitis B
Discrimination Case in Xinjiang Successfully Resumes Student Status''
[12 yue 16 ri, xingqiwu, xinjiang yigan qishi di yi dan dangshiren liyi
shunli bu ban qiquan xueji], Boxun (Online), 18 December 06.
\44\ China Development Brief, ``Hepatitis B Stigma Provokes Outcry
in Xinjiang;'' Mure Dickie, ``Parents in Xinjiang Drop Discrimination
Suit,'' Financial Times (Online), 18 September 07; ``Xinjiang Hepatitis
Students Fight School Ban,'' Radio Free Asia; ``7 Hepatitis B-Positive
Chinese Students Sue,'' Associated Press, reprinted in China Daily
(Online), 23 October 07.
\45\ Ibid.
\46\ China Development Brief, ``Hepatitis B Stigma Provokes Outcry
in Xinjiang;'' ``Xinjiang Hepatitis Students Fight School Ban,'' Radio
Free Asia.
\47\ Ibid.
\48\ Ibid.; Mure Dickie, ``Parents in Xinjiang Drop Discrimination
Suit;'' ``7 Hepatitis B-Positive Chinese Students Sue,'' Associated
Press.
\49\ ``Xinjiang Hepatitis Students Fight School Ban,'' Radio Free
Asia.
\50\ ``Survey Shows Half of Chinese Discriminate against People
with HIV/AIDS'' [Mintiao xianshi duoban zhongguoren paichi
aizibingren], Voice of America (Online), 14 May 07.
\51\ Xin Dingding, ``Law To Protect Hepatitis B Carriers' Rights,''
China Daily (Online), 14 July 07.
\52\ Mure Dickie, ``Nokia China Hit with Discrimination Suit,''
Financial Times (Online), 13 March 07.
\53\ ``Nokia Hepatitis B Discrimination Case Will Open in Court on
August 9, People are Welcome To Attend'' [Nokia yigan qishi an jiang yu
8 yue 9 ri kaiting, huanying canjia pangting, caifang], Boxun (Online),
3 August 07; ``Nokia China Faces Lawsuit over Rejection of Hepatitis-B
Carrier,'' Helsingin Sanomat (Online), 16 August 07.
\54\ Ibid.; ``August 15 Dongguan Nokia Employment Discrimination
Case Outcome and Situation Report from the Plaintiff's Lawyer'' [8 yue
15 ri dongguan nuojiya jiuye qishi anjian shenpan jieguo yiji yu wofang
lushi jiaoliu qingkuang huibao], Gandan Xiangzhao (Online), 15 August
07.
\55\ CECC Staff Search. See also, ``August 15 Dongguan Nokia
Employment Discrimination Case Outcome and Situation Report from the
Plaintiff's Lawyer,'' Gandan Xiangzhao.
\56\ Chinese Human Rights Defenders (Online), ``Government Issues
New Regulations Protecting the Employment Rights of Hepatitis B
Carriers'' [Guanfang chuxin gui yaoqiu weihu yigan biaomian kangyuan
xiedaizhe jiuye quanli], 31 May 07; Bonny Ling and Wing Lam,
``Hepatitis B: A Catalyst for Anti-Discrimination Reforms?,'' 2 China
Rights Forum 67, 72-73 (2007).
\57\ ``New Law Allows Job Seekers To Litigate Against
Discrimination,'' Xinhua (Online), 30 August 07; Xin Dingding, ``Law To
Protect Hepatitis B Carriers' Rights.''
\58\ PRC Employment Promotion Law, enacted 30 August 07, arts. 30,
62; ``A Call for NGO Colleagues to Pay Attention to the Employment
Promotion Law Anti-Discrimination Provision that Leaves out
Discrimination against Carriers of Hepatitis B and HIV'' [Huyu NGO
tongren guanzhu ``jiuye cujin fa'' fei qishi tiaokuan yilou yigan he
aizi qishi wenti], Boxun (Online), 2 March 07.
\59\ ``Legislation for Anti-Discrimination in Employment Urgently
Needed'' [Fan yigan jiuye qishi ying lifa], China Youth Daily (Online),
5 February 07; Bonny Ling and Wing Lam, ``Hepatitis B: A Catalyst for
Anti-Discrimination Reforms?,'' 2 China Rights Forum 67, 71 (2007).
\60\ Xin Dingding, ``Law To Protect Hepatitis B Carriers' Rights.''
\61\ ``SARS Whistle-Blower Barred from US Prize Trip,'' Agence
France-Presse, reprinted in South China Morning Post (Online), 12 July
07.
\62\ Emergency Response Regulations for Major Epidemics of Animal
Diseases [Zhongda dongwu yiqing yingji tiaoli], issued 18 November 05,
Ch. 3, art. 17.
\63\ Human Rights in China (Online), ``State Secrets: China's Legal
Labyrinth,'' June 2007, 180.
\64\ Regulation of the People's Republic of China on the Public
Disclosure of Government Information [Zhonghua renmin gongheguo zhengfu
xinxi gongkai tiaoli], issued 5 April 07, art. 14.
\65\ Cao Haidong and Fu Jianfeng, ``20 Years of Health Care Reform
in China'' [Zhongguo yigai 20 nian], Southern Daily (Online), 5 August
05; Ofra Anson and Shifang Sun, Health Care in Rural China (Ashgate,
Aldershot, Hants, 2005), 15-17.
\66\ Yuanli Liu, ``Development of the Rural Health Insurance System
in China,'' Health Policy and Planning, 19(3), 2004, 160.
\67\ ``Residents of Chinese Cities Live on Average 12 Years Longer
than Those in Rural Areas--What Is the Cause?'' [Zhongguo dachengshi
renjun shouming bi nongcun gao 12 nian--shi he yuanyin?], Xinhua
(Online), 17 November 05.
\68\ ``Facts and Figures: Widening Gap between China's Urban, Rural
Areas,'' People's Daily (Online), 3 March 06.
\69\ ``Residents of Chinese Cities Live on Average 12 Years Longer
than Those in Rural Areas-What Is the Cause?,'' Xinhua.
\70\ ``National Healthcare Needs Gradual Growth,'' China Daily
(Online), 26 March 07.
\71\ ``China will Augment Basic Urban Healthcare Insurance,''
Xinhua, reprinted in China.org (Online), 25 July 07.
\72\ ``Premier Wen Sees How Urban Medicare Works,'' Xinhua,
reprinted in China Daily (Online), 22 July 07.
\73\ David Blumenthal and William Hsiao, ``Privatization and its
Discontents--The Evolving Chinese Health Care System,'' 353 New England
Journal of Medicine 1165, 1169 (2005); CECC, 2006 Annual Report, 109.
\74\ ``Rural Medical System Covers Nearly Half of Farmers,''
Xinhua, reprinted in China.org (Online), 11 September 06; ``National
Healthcare Needs Gradual Growth,'' China Daily.
\75\ ``Rural Medical System Covers Nearly Half of Farmers,''
Xinhua; ``Healthcare Plans in Pipeline,'' China Daily, reprinted in
China.org (Online), 12 March 07.
\76\ Duncan Hewitt, ``China Rural Health Worries,'' BBC News
(Online), 4 July 02.
\77\ ``China Rebuilding Rural Cooperative Medicare System,''
Xinhua, reprinted in Beijing Review (Online), 21 February 07.
\78\ ``Healthcare Plans in Pipeline,'' China Daily; ``Gov't under
Pressure To Make Rural Healthcare System Work,'' Xinhua, reprinted in
China.org (Online), 21 April 07.
\79\ ``Rural Medical System Covers Nearly Half of Farmers,''
Xinhua; ``Rural Cooperative Healthcare Network Planned [sic],'' Xinhua,
reprinted in China.org (Online), 8 June 07.
\80\ ``Half of All Farmers Do Not Seek Care for Illness'' [Zhongguo
nongmin yiban kanbuqi bing], Beijing News (Online), 6 November 04;
``Half of All Children Who Die of Illness in the Countryside Had Not
Received Medical Treatment'' [Wo guo yin bing siwang de nongcun ertong
reng you yibanwei dedao yiliao], People's Daily (Online), 17 August 05;
CECC, 2005 Annual Report, 11 October 05, 72.
\81\ ``Gov't under Pressure To Make Rural Healthcare System Work,''
Xinhua.
\82\ ``China Rebuilding Rural Cooperative Medicare System,''
Xinhua.
\83\ ``Survey: Medical Expenses Account for 11.8% of Family's
Annual Spending,'' Yahoo!, translated on the Web site of Women of
China, 26 December 06.
\84\ ``Doctors Face Growing Risk of Violent Medical Disputes,''
Xinhua, reprinted in China.org (Online), 18 April 07.
\85\ Ibid.
\86\ ``Rural Cooperative Healthcare Network Planned [sic],''
Xinhua.
\87\ ``Rural Medical System Covers Nearly Half of Farmers,''
Xinhua.
Notes to Section II--Human Trafficking
\1\ Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, U.S.
Department of State, Trafficking in Persons Report--China, 12 June 07,
80.
\2\ PRC Protection of Minors Law, enacted 4 September 91, amended
29 December 06.
\3\ Ibid., art. 41.
\4\ ``More Forced into Labor, Prostitution,'' China Daily (Online),
27 July 07.
\5\ National Bureau of Statistics, China Statistical Yearbook 2006,
Table 23-11; ``Ministry of Public Security Strengthens the Combating of
Crimes of Trafficking in Women and Children'' [Zhongguo gongan jiguan
jiada daji guaimai funu ertong fanzui lidu], Xinhua (Online), 26 July
07.
\6\ U.S. Department of State, Trafficking in Persons Report--China,
80.
\7\ ``More Forced into Labor, Prostitution,'' China Daily.
\8\ Experts believe that Chinese law only considers those under the
age of 14 to be ``minors'' and automatic victims of trafficking, with
no need for personnel to have them examined for signs of coercion or
the use of force. CECC Staff Correspondence; ``Ministry of Public
Security Official: Human Trafficking for the Purposes of Forced Labor
and Sexual Exploitation Has Increased'' [Gonganbu guanyuan: yi boxue he
seqing wei mudi de renkou guaimai shangsheng], China Daily, reprinted
in China Economic Net (Online), 27 July 07. See, for example, the PRC
Criminal Law, enacted 1 July 79, amended 14 March 97, 25 December 99,
31 August 01, 29 December 01, 28 December 02, 28 February 05, 29 June
06, art. 240.
\9\ UNICEF (Online), ``China: Trafficking of Children and Women,''
last visited 4 October 07; ``China To Issue An Anti-Trafficking Plan''
[Zhongguo jiang zhiding guojia fan renkou guaimai xingdong jihua],
Xinhua (Online), 12 July 06.
\10\ U.S. Department of State, Trafficking in Persons Report--
China, 80.
\11\ Ibid.
\12\ CECC Staff Correspondence.
\13\ UNICEF, ``China: Trafficking of Children and Women;'' ``China
To Issue An Anti-Trafficking Plan,'' Xinhua; ``Hunan Court Sentences
Infant Traffickers; New Orphanage Standards Due Soon,'' CECC China
Human Rights and Rule of Law Update, April 2006, 3-4; ``Social Service
Organizations Involved in Two Child Trafficking Cases,'' CECC China
Human Rights and Rule of Law Update, January 2006, 11; Bureau of
Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, U.S. Department of State, Country
Reports on Human Rights Practices--2006, China (includes Tibet, Hong
Kong, and Macau), 6 March 07, sec. 5.
\14\ U.S. Department of State, Country Reports on Human Rights
Practices--2006, China, sec. 5.
\15\ ``Social Service Organizations Involved in Two Child
Trafficking Cases,'' CECC China Human Rights and Rule of Law Update,
11; ``Hunan Court Sentences Infant Traffickers; New Orphanage Standards
Due Soon,'' CECC China Human Rights and Rule of Law Update, 3-4; Cindy
Sui, ``Baby Trafficking in PRC's Rural Areas `Widespread,''' Agence
France-Presse, 5 February 05 (Open Source Center, 10 February 05).
\16\ U.S. Department of State, Trafficking in Persons Report--
China, 80.
\17\ United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (Online), ``The
United Nations Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime and Its
Protocols,'' last viewed 4 October 07; UN Convention Against
Transnational Organized Crime, adopted by General Assembly resolution
55/25 of 15 November 2000, entry into force 29 September 03; Protocol
to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially
Women and Children (commonly known as Palermo Protocol), adopted by
General Assembly resolution 55/25 of 15 November 2000, entry into force
on 25 December 03.
\18\ Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination
Against Women, adopted by General Assembly resolution 34/180 of 18
December 79, entry into force 3 September 81, art. 6; Convention on the
Rights of the Child, adopted by the General Assembly resolution 44/25
of 20 November 1989, entry into force 2 September 90, art. 35; Human
Trafficking.org (Online), ``Government of China's Plan of Action To
Prevent, Protect, Prosecute and Reintegrate,'' last viewed 4 October
07.
\19\ PRC Law on the Protection of Women's Rights and Interests,
enacted 3 April 92, amended 28 August 05, art. 39.
\20\ ``China To Issue a National Anti-Trafficking Plan of Action,''
Xinhua (Online), 12 July 06; ``Panel Set To Target Human Trafficking,''
China Daily (Online), 4 September 07.
\21\ For example, the Ministry of Justice launched a three month
campaign in 2000 that reportedly resulted in the rescue of some 10,000
girls. CECC, 2003 Annual Report, 2 October 03, 53. From 2001 to 2003,
the Ministry of Public Security initiated a series of ``Strike Hard''
campaigns that reportedly solved 20,360 cases involving 42,215 victims.
CECC, 2004 Annual Report, 5 October 04, 137, endnote 527.
\22\ Murray Scot Tanner, ``State Coercion and the Balance of Awe:
The 1983-1986 `Stern Blows' Anti-Crime Campaign,'' China Journal, July
2000.
\23\ Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, U.S.
Department of State, Trafficking in Persons Interim Assessment--China,
19 January 07.
\24\ Ibid.
\25\ Ibid.
\26\ U.S. Department of State, Trafficking in Persons Report--
China, 80; ``Social Service Organizations Involved in Two Child
Trafficking Cases,'' CECC China Human Rights and Rule of Law Update,
11. See also, CECC, 2006 Annual Report, 20 September 06, 100.
\27\ Murray Scot Tanner and Eric Green, ``Principals and Secret
Agents: Central versus Local Control over Policing and Obstacles to
`Rule of Law' in China,'' 191 China Quarterly 644, 666 (2007).
\28\ Ibid.
\29\ U.S. Department of State, Trafficking in Persons Report--
China, 80; ``Vietnamese Police Arrests Three for Trafficking of
Children to China,'' Agence France-Presse, 17 July 07 (Open Source
Center, 17 July 07); ``China, US agree To Enhance Coop on Global
Issues,'' Xinhua (Online), 10 August 06.
\30\ ``ILO, China Join To Combat Trafficking in Children and
Women,'' Xinhua, reprinted in China.org (Online), 12 July 03;
International Organization for Migration (Online), ``China Profile,''
July 2007; U.S. Department of State, Trafficking in Persons Interim
Assessment--China.
\31\ U.S. Department of State, Trafficking in Persons Interim
Assessment--China; U.S. Department of State, Trafficking in Persons
Report--China, 81.
\32\ ``Panel Set To Target Human Trafficking,'' China Daily. See
also, ``Ministry of Public Security Strengthens the Combating of Crimes
of Trafficking in Women and Children,'' Xinhua.
Notes to Section II--North Korean Refugees
\1\ CECC Staff Interviews; Joel Charney, ``Acts of Betrayal: The
Challenge of Protecting North Koreans in China,'' Refugees
International, 12 May 05.
\2\ International Crisis Group, Perilous Journey, Asia Report No.
122, 26 October 2006, 1.
\3\ Department of State, 2007 Trafficking in Persons Report.
\4\ Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, U.S. Department of
State, Country Reports on Human Rights Practices--2006, China (includes
Tibet, Hong Kong, and Macau), 6 March 6, 07.
\5\ Kim Young Jin, ``Chinese Security Officer in Yenji Testifies,
`Increase in Arrests at the End of the Year,''' Daily NK, 1 February 1,
05.
\6\ Kim Young Jin, ``China Arrests, Shortly Repatriated to North
Korea,'' Daily NK, 26 June 07; Donna M. Hughes, ``How Can I Be Sold
Like This?: The Trafficking of North Korean Women Refugees,'' National
Review (Online), 19 July 05; International Crisis Group, ``Perilous
Journeys: The Plight of North Koreans in China and Beyond,'' Asia
Report No. 122--26 October 06, 6; Ronald Schaefer, ``The Forgotten
Refugees,'' OhmyNews Web site, 9 October 06.
\7\ Humanitarian workers assisting refugees have reported that many
North Korean refugees attempt to reach Mongolia, and as a result China
is constructing six new prisons in this region. See Charlotte Eager,
``Korea's Oskar Schindler,'' Daily Mail, 30 June 07. On the
construction of new facilities on China's North Korean border, see
Melanie Kirkpatrick, ``Let Them Go: China Should Open its Border to
North Korean Refugees,'' Wall Street Journal (Online), 15 October 06.
\8\ Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, 28 July 51,
United Nations Conference of Plenipotentiaries on the Status of
Refugees and Stateless Persons convened under General Assembly
resolution 429 (V) of 14 December 50, art. 33; China acceded to the
Convention on September 24, 1982. ``MFA Spokesman Calls North Korean in
China `Illegal Migrants' and `Not Refugees','' CECC Virtual Academy
(Online), 3 October 06.
\9\ ``Foreign Ministry Spokesman Qin Gang's Regular Press
Conference on 19 June, 2007,'' PRC Ministry of Foreign Affairs Web
site, 20 June 07.
\10\ ``Democratic People's Republic of Korea Ministry of State
Security, People's Republic of China Ministry of Public Security,
Mutual Cooperation Protocol for the Work of Maintaining National
Security and Social Order in the Border Area,'' 12 August 1986,
reprinted on the Rescue the North Korean People Urgent Action Network
(RENK) Web site. According to James Seymour, RENK obtained and
translated the document in December 2002. Seymour writes that ``this
document cannot be authenticated, but it does not seem implausible.''
On the 1998 agreement, see also Cho Kye-ch'ang, ``Adds Article on
Reinforcing Protection of a Special Train with Kim Jung-il on; Scope of
Illegal Border-Crossing Expanded; Joint Countermeasures Included to
Prepare Against Armed North Korean Escapees,'' Yonhap (Online), 22
January 07.
\11\ James D. Seymour, ``China: Background Paper on the Situation
of North Koreans in China,'' Writenet, January 2005, 4-6.
\12\ When China acceded to the Refugee Convention in 1982, it
committed to honoring all provisions under the Convention and made only
two reservations, neither of which is related to Article 33 on
refoulement. Under Articles 26 and 42(2) of the Vienna Convention on
the Law of Treaties, China's separate bilateral agreement with North
Korea would not exempt it from compliance with its treaty obligations.
\13\ Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, art. 1.
\14\ The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in North
Korea, ``Question of the Violation of Human Rights and Fundamental
Freedom in any Part of the World: Situation of Human Rights in the
Democratic People's Republic of Korea,'' 10 January 05, 13.
\15\ ``Government Allows North Korean Refugees to Travel Directly
to the United States,'' CECC Virtual Academy 28 August 06.
\16\ Human Rights Watch, ``North Korea: Harsher Policies Against
Border-Crossers,'' March 2007, 7-8; Another source dates this tougher
policy from 2005. Kwon Jeong Hyun, ``10 Years of Defector Succession''
Daily NK, 16 May 07.
\17\ Human Rights Watch, 4-9.
\18\ Norma Kang Muico, ``An Absence of Choice: The Sexual
Exploitation of North Korean Women in China,'' Anti-Slavery
International, 2005.
\19\ International Crisis Group, 18, citing David Hawk, ``The
Hidden Gulag: Exposing North Korea's Prison Camps,'' U.S. Committee for
Human Rights in Korea, October 2003; Kim Rahn, ``Female Inmates in
North Face Compulsory Abortion,'' Korea Times, 29 September 06; Michael
Sheridan, ``On the Death or Freedom Trail with Kim's Starving
Fugitives,'' Times Online (London), 3 December 06. Kwon Jeong Hyun,
``10 Years of Defector Succession,'' Daily NK, 16 May 07.
\20\ Stephen Haggard and Marcus Noland, ``The North Korean Refugee
Crisis: Human Rights and International Response,'' U.S. Committee for
Human Rights in North Korea, 2006, 37-40.
\21\ Haggard and Noland, 38-39.
\22\ Haggard and Noland, 38; Convention Relating to the Status of
Refugees, art. 35.
\23\ Nicholas D. Kristof, ``Escape from North Korea,'' New York
Times (Online), 4 June 07; ``China Imprisons N. Korean Defector Ring,''
Chosun Daily (Online) 28 May 07.
\24\ ``NK Refugee Supporter Released in China,'' Daily NK, 29
November 06.
\25\ The State Council included the regulation on its 2006
Legislative Plan, and a January 2006 State Council General Office
circular on the State Council's legislative work plan for the year
listed the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Public
Security, and the Ministry of Civil Affairs as drafting Temporary
Regulations on the Administration of Refugees. ``Refugees Nearing Dream
of Citizenship,'' People's Daily (Online), 1 June 07.
\26\ ``Refugees Nearing Dream of Citizenship'' People's Daily.
\27\ ``Statement of the Media by United Nations High Commissioner
for Refugees Antonio Guterres, on Conclusion of his Mission to the
People's Republic of China,'' United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees, 23 March 06.
Notes to Section II--Freedom of Residence and Travel
\1\ For a fieldwork-based case study that discusses the impact of
the hukou system, including provisions allowing family members of urban
hukou holders to transfer their status, see Dorothy J. Solinger, ``The
Sad Story of Zheng Erji Who Landed in the City Through the Favors
Reform-Era Policies Bestowed But Rewrote the Rules While Suffering
Wrongs, Once There,'' in Dorothy J. Solinger, ed., Narratives of the
Chinese Economic Reforms (Lewiston, NY: The Edwin Mellen Press, 2005),
113-127, esp. 121, 123, 125.
\2\ See, e.g., Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR),
adopted and proclaimed by General Assembly resolution 217A (III) of 10
December 48, art. 2, 13; International Covenant on Civil and Political
Rights (ICCPR) , adopted by General Assembly resolution 2200A (XXI) of
16 December 66, entry into force 23 March 76, art. 2(1), 12(1), 12(3),
26; the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights
(ICESCR) adopted by General Assembly resolution 2200A (XXI) of 16
December 66, entry into force 3 January 76, art. 2(2). [See Section X,
``Protection of Internationally Recognized Labor Rights,'' for more
information on China's obligations to comply with internationally
recognized labor rights, include provisions relevant to migrant
workers' status.]
\3\ China is a party to the ICESCR and a signatory to the ICCPR .
The Chinese government has committed itself to ratifying, and thus
bringing its laws into conformity with, the ICCPR and reaffirmed its
commitment as recently as April 13, 2006, in its application for
membership in the UN Human Rights Council. China's top leaders have
previously stated on three separate occasions that they are preparing
for ratification of the ICCPR, including in a September 6, 2005,
statement by Politburo member and State Councilor Luo Gan at the 22nd
World Congress on Law, in statements by Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao
during his May 2005 Europe tour, and in a January 27, 2004, speech by
Chinese President Hu Jintao before the French National Assembly. As a
signatory to the ICCPR, China is required under Article 18 of the
Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, to which it is a party, ``to
refrain from acts which would defeat the object and purpose of a
treaty'' it has signed. Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties,
enacted 23 May 69, entry into force 27 January 80, art. 18.
\4\ UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR),
``UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights: Concluding
observations: People's Republic of China (including Hong Kong and
Macao)'' (Online via UNHCR Refword)13 May 2005. E/C.12/1/Add.107,
para. 15. This committee is charged with monitoring states' compliance
with the ICESCR.
\5\ State Council Notice on Endorsing the Public Security Bureau's
Opinions on Promoting Reform of the Management System for Residence
Permits in Small Towns and Cities [Guowuyuan pizhuan gong'anbu guanyu
tuijin xiaochengzhen huji guanli zhidu gaige yijian de tongzhi], issued
30 March 01. Under these rules, migrants to small cities or towns may
keep their land rights in their villages of origin. For more
information on earlier reforms, see the CECC Topic Paper ``China's
Household Registration System: Sustained Reform Needed To Protect
China's Rural Migrants,'' October 2005.
\6\ See the CECC 2003 Annual Report for more information. CECC,
2003 Annual Report, 2 October 03, 52.
\7\ Regulations on Legal Aid [Falu yuanzhu tiaoli], issued 21 July
03.
\8\ State Council Office Circular on Improving Work on Management
and Services for Migrant Workers in Cities [Guowuyuan bangongting
guanyu zuohao nongmin jincheng wugong jiuye guanli he fuwu gongzuo de
tongzhi], issued 5 January 03.
\9\ State Council Circular Transmitting the Opinion of the
Education and Other Ministries Relating to Further Work on Migrant
Children's Compulsory Education [Guowuyuan bangongting zhuanfa jiaoyubu
deng bumen guanyu jin yibu zuohao jincheng wugong jiuye nongmin zinu
yiwu jiaoyu gongzuo yijian de tongzhi], issued 17 September 03.
\10\ State Council Office Circular Regarding Work on Improving the
Employment Situation for Migrants in Urban Areas [Guowuyuan bangongting
guanyu jin yibu zuo hao gaishan nongmin jincheng jiuye huanjing gongzuo
de tongzhi], issued 27 December 04.
\11\ ``Labor Ministry Officials Remove Regulatory Barrier to
Migrants Seeking Work in Cities,'' CECC Virtual Academy, 4 October 06.
\12\ Central Party Committee, State Council Opinion on Promoting
the Construction of a New Socialist Countryside [Zhong-gong zhongyang
guowuyuan guanyu tuijin shehuizhuyi xin nongcun jianshe de ruogan
yijian], issued 31 December 05. See also ``Communist Party, State
Council Set Rural Reform Goals for 2006,'' CECC China Human Rights and
Rule of Law Update, April 2006, 8.
\13\ State Council Opinion on Resolving Migrant Worker Problems
[Guowuyuan guanyu jiejue nongmingong wenti de ruogan yijian], issued 27
March 2006.
\14\ PRC Compulsory Education Law, adopted 12 April 86, revised 29
June 06, art. 12; ``Amended Compulsory Education Law Would Assure
Migrant Children the Right To Attend School'' [``Yiwu jiaoyufa''
xiuding cao'an baozhang liudong renkou zinu shangxue], CCTV (Online), 1
May 06.
\15\ Resolution Concerning the Question of Delegate Quotas and
Elections for the 11th Session of the National People's Congress''
[Guanyu shiyi jie quanguo renda daibiao ming'e he xuanju wenti de
jueding], Guangdong News (Online), 16 March 07. ``NPC's Approval of Key
Laws Seen as Promotion of Social Justice by Chinese Academics,'' Xinhua
News reprinted by BBC (Online), 16 March 07. Whether the resolution
will give migrant workers a greater voice in practice remains unclear.
In an article from the Xinhua news agency, one migrant worker expressed
concern over election logistics since most migrant workers lack urban
residence registrations, making them ineligible to vote in the cities
where they reside. ``Rural Migrant Workers To Enter China's Top
Legislature,'' Xinhua (Online), 8 March 2007. In January 2006, the
Shanghai local people's congress (LPC) for the first time allowed two
migrant workers from Jiangsu province to attend a session of the
Shanghai LPC as observers. The China Economic Times, a State Council-
sponsored publication, criticized the Shanghai LPC, however, for not
allowing the two migrants to serve as full representatives. It noted
that hukou restrictions bar many migrants from standing for election,
and that none of the 1,000 LPC delegates attending the session
represented Shanghai's 4 million migrant workers. ``State Council
Newspaper Criticizes Lack of Migrant Representation in Shanghai LPC,''
CECC China Human Rights and Rule of Law Newsletter, March 2006, 13-14.
\16\ ``Hukou Reform Submitted To State Council, Legal and Fixed
Place of Residence as Criteria for Shifting Hukou Registration'' [Huji
gaige wenjian bao guowuyuan, hefa guding zhusuo cheng qianyi tiaojian],
Guangdong News (Online), 23 May 97. ``Many Difficulties Remain in Hukou
Reform, MPS Launches Investigation and Research into Legislating a
Hukou Law [Huji gaige cun zhuduo nandian gong'anbu qidong hukoufa lifa
diaoyan],'' Legal Daily (Online), 20 June 07. There has been some
dispute over the document's submission to the State Council. For
background see Carl Minzner, ``Hukou Reforms Under Consideration,''
Chinese Law and Politics Blog, 4 June 07.
\17\ The current reforms bear close resemblance to earlier
proposals put forth by central government officials. Nevertheless, one
scholar has suggested that the current reforms are more liberal than
past efforts in that they only demand citizens meet a residence
requirement, rather than both residence and income requirements, for
transferring hukou. See Carl Minzner, ``Hukou Reforms Under
Consideration,'' Chinese Law and Politics Blog, 4 June 07.
\18\ See Max Tunon, ``Internal Labour Migration in China: Features
and Response,'' International Labour Organization (Online), April 2006,
10, 22-23, 35.
\19\ For more information on local regulations that condition hukou
transfers on meeting such criteria, see ``China's Household
Registration System: Sustained Reform Needed To Protect China's Rural
Migrants,'' 4-5.
\20\ Only certain types of rental housing qualify. The reforms
permit other groups of migrants to obtain an urban hukou based on
economic and educational criteria similarly used in other localities to
restrict the number of migrants eligible to change their hukou status.
Chengdu Municipal Party Committee, Chengdu City People's Government
Opinion Concerning Deepening Residence Registration Reform and
Reforming and Deepening the Integration of Cities and Towns (Trial)
[Zhong-gong chengdu shiwei chengdushi renmin zhengfu guanyu shenhua
huji zhidu gaige gaishen shenru tuijin cheng xiang yitihua de yijian
(shixing)], issued 20 October 06, art. 2.
\21\ ``Shenzhen Municipal Authorities Announce Tighter Controls
Over Migrant Population,'' CECC China Human Rights and Rule of Law
Update, September 2005, 9-10.
\22\ ``Shenyang City Government Revokes Reforms to Temporary
Residence Permit System,'' CECC China Human Rights and Rule of Law
Update, February 2006, 9-10.
\23\ ``Beijing Eliminates Regulations on the Management of
Migrants'' [Beijing feizhi wailai renyuan guanli tiaoli], Beijing News
(Online), 26 March 05.
\24\ ``Farmers Who Enter Cities and See a Doctor Can Be
Reimbursed'' [Nongmin jincheng kanbing ke xiangshou baoxiao], Beijing
News (Online), 23 August 05.
\25\ Ma Lie, ``Xi'an District Grants Migrant Farmers Equal
Treatment,'' China Daily (Online), 1 September 06 (Open Source Center,
1 September 06).
\26\ ``Chongqing High People's Court Issues Provisions, Traffic
Accident Compensation To Be Carried Out According to `Same Life, Same
Value' [Principle]'' [Chongqing gao yuan chutai guiding, chehuo
peichang jiang zhixing ``tongming tongjia''], Xinhua (Online), 19
October 06. A Chongqing court enforced this principle in December 2006
when it ordered that the parents of a child killed in a traffic
accident be compensated at the rate for urban hukou holders, despite
the fact that they were migrant workers with non-Chongqing hukou
status. ```Same Life, Same Value' Ruling in Chongqing's First Urban-
Rural Resident Car Accident Compensation Case'' [Chongqing shouli
chengxiang jumin chehuo peichang an `tongming tongjia' panjue], Xinhua
(Online), 13 December 06. For more information on compensation levels,
see the CECC 2006 Annual Report, 20 September 06, 117, and ``Lawyer
Petitions for Constitutional Review of Discriminatory SPC
Interpretation,'' CECC China Human Rights and Rule of Law Update, June
2006, 8-9.
\27\ ``Supreme People's Court To Release Determination on Issue of
`Same Life, Different Value' [Zui gao fayuan ni chutai xiangguan
jueding jiejue ``tongming bu tongjia'' wenti], Xinhua (Online), 14
March 07. In 2003, the SPC issued a judicial interpretation mandating a
lower rate of compensation for rural hukou holders. ``Supreme People's
Court's Judicial Interpretation Regarding Compensation Cases for
Personal Injuries (2003)'' [Zui gao renmin fayuan guanyu shenli renshen
sunhai peichang anjian shiyong falu ruogan wenti de jieshi], Supreme
People's Court (Online), 4 December 03, art. 29.
\28\ State Council Office Circular on Improving Work on Management
and Services for Migrant Workers in Cities [Guowuyuan bangongting
guanyu zuohao nongmin jincheng wugong jiuye guanli he fuwu gongzuo de
tongzhi], issued 5 January 03.
\29\ ``Number of Temporary Residents Nationwide is 86,730,000,
Floating Population Needs Establishment of Socialization Management
Model'' [Quanguo dengji zanzhu renkou 8673 wan ren, liudong renkou ying
jianli shehuihua guanli moshi], Legal Daily (Online), 26 October 05.
\30\ Henan Provincial Party Committee and Government Circular on
``A Program for the Construction of a Peaceful Henan'' [Henan sheng wei
sheng zhengfu guanyu ``ping'an henan jianshe gangyao'' de tongzhi], PRC
Central Government (Online), 26 April 06.
\31\ ICCPR, art. 12. General Comment 27 to this article states,
``The refusal by a State to issue a passport or prolong its validity
for a national residing abroad may deprive this person of the right to
leave the country of residence and to travel elsewhere.'' Human Rights
Committee, General Comment 27, Freedom of Movement (Art.12), U.N. Doc
CCPR/C/21/Rev.1/Add.9 (1999), para. 9.
\32\ PRC Law on Passports, adopted 29 April 06, art. 13(7). For an
example of a beneficial provision within the law, see, e.g., Article 6,
which stipulates time limits for officials to approve applications and
allows applicants to contest rejected applications.
\33\ Scholars and NGO staff have debated the legal bases
surrounding the government's recent actions toward Yang. ``Welcome
Return for Chinese Dissident, Others Not Free To Travel,'' Dui Hua
(Online), 27 August 07; Donald C. Clarke, ``Yang Jianli and China's
Passport Law,'' Chinese Law Prof Blog (Online), 28 August 07.
\34\ ``Yang Jianli's Application for Passport To Go to U.S. Still
Has Not Been Approved'' [Yang Jianli shenqing huzhao lijing fu mei reng
wei bei pizhun], Radio Free Asia (Online), 15 June 07.
\35\ See the CECC Political Prisoner Database for more information
on Yang's case. Although initially charged with illegal entry, he was
later charged with espionage for alleged connections with Taiwan.
\36\ ``Attorney Tang Jingling Brings Administrative Suit Against
Customs for Taking His Passport and Preventing Him from Leaving the
Country'' [Tang Jingling lushi dui haiguan kouliu huzhao zuzhi ta
chuguo tiqi xingzheng susong], Chinese Human Rights Defenders (Online),
6 December 06.
\37\ Claudia Blume, ``International PEN Concerned About Writers'
Freedom of Expression in China,'' Voice of America (Online), 6 February
07.
\38\ Anita Chang, ``China Bars Dissident's Wife From Leaving,''
Associated Press (Online), 11 June 07. ``Zeng Jinyan and Yao Lifa
Prevented from Leaving Country To Attend Human Rights Conference in
Geneva'' [Zeng Jinyan Yao Lifa bei jinzhi chujing dao Rineiwa chuxi
guoji renquan huiyi], Radio Free Asia (Online), 11 June 07.
\39\ ``Mongolian Dissident's Passport Application Denied for
`Possible Harm to State Security and National Interests,''' Southern
Mongolian Human Rights Information Center (Online), 8 August 07.
\40\ ``Persecution of Zheng Enchong Must Stop: HRIC,'' Human Rights
in China (Online), 22 August 07.
\41\ Maureen Fan, ``Wife of Chinese Activist Detained at Beijing
Airport, Authorities Forcibly Return Her to Home Village,'' Washington
Post (Online), 25 August 07.
\42\ ``CAA Urges Chinese Government To Release Rights Lawyer Gao
Zhisheng and his Family Members,'' China Aid Association (Online), 27
September 07. For more information on Gao, see the CECC Political
Prisoner Database.
\43\ ``China Confiscates Muslims' Passports,'' Radio Free Asia
(Online), 28 June 07. See also ``Activist: Members of Muslim Minority
Group in China Forced To Surrender Their Passports,'' Associated Press,
reprinted in International Herald Tribune, 20 July 07.
\44\ Yang Yingchun, ``Ismail Tiliwaldi, While Speaking at an
Autonomous Region-Wide Religion Work Meeting, Calls for Stronger
Management Over Pilgrimage and the `Two Religions' To Safeguard the
Masses' Interest,'' Xinjiang Daily, 11 July 09 (Open Source Center, 13
July 07).
\45\ ``China Sentences Underground Pastor to 7.5 Years in Prison,''
Agence France Presse (Online), 8 July 06, reprinted on the China Aid
Association Web site. See the CECC Political Prisoner Database for more
information.
\46\ ``Two Priests Detained in Wenzhou After Arrest on Return from
Europe,'' Union of Catholic Asian News (UCAN), 3 October 06;
``Underground' Chinese Catholic Priests Charged, Likely To Face
Trial,'' UCAN (Online), 26 October 06. ``Two Underground Priests From
Wenzhou Soon To Be Freed,'' AsiaNews, 17 May 07; ``Two Underground
Priests, Arrested After Pilgrimage, Sentenced Six Months After
Arrest,'' UCAN (Online), 16 May 07. Authorities released Shao from
prison in May to obtain medical treatment. ``Jailed Wenzhou Priest
Released Provisionally For Medical Treatment,'' UCAN, 30 May 07.
Authorities released Jiang in August. ``Second Of Two Jailed Wenzhou
Priests Released, Diagnosed With Heart Conditions,'' UCAN, 29 August
07. See the CECC Political Prisoner Database for more information.
Jiang Surang is also known by the name Jiang Sunian.
\47\ Timothy Chow, ``Chinese House Church Historian Denied ID
Card,'' Compass Direct News (Online), 17 February 06, reprinted on the
China Aid Association Web site.
<all>