The European Union's conclusion that it should not confront China at the annual session of the UN Human Rights Commission in Geneva was welcomed by Beijing yesterday as "a correct decision", which would improve ties between the EU and China.
The United States will decide shortly whether to sponsor a resolution criticising China's human rights record at the Commission, a White House spokesman said yesterday. But the EU decision, taken at a meeting of foreign ministers in Brussels on Monday, puts pressure on Washington to give China more time to implement commitments on human rights.
Both houses of the US Congress recently passed resolutions calling on the administration to sponsor a critical resolution, following a clampdown in China on a fledgling pro-democracy movement.
The White House is not, however, obliged to act on the Congress resolutions, and may opt instead for a wide-ranging resolution on human rights without specifically targeting Beijing. This was suggested by the German Foreign Minister, Mr Joschka Fischer, who said European delegates to the six-week Geneva session, which began on Monday, may side with the United States to back a "thematic" resolution urging more democratic rights in developing nations.
The EU decision is a major diplomatic victory for China, which had lobbied hard to prevent a confrontation over human rights, and for the European backers of a policy of engagement with a country which is now a major and expanding world trading nation.
"We have always been of the view that the correct way to patch up differences on the question of human rights is to conduct dialogue and co-operation based on equality and mutual respect," China's Foreign Ministry spokesman, Mr Sun Yuxi, told reporters yesterday.