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Slow progress in China

Xi's trip to the West, shows US still has leverage on religious rights
Slow progress in China

U.S. President Barack Obama, left, addresses the Nuclear Security Summit meeting in Washington, D.C. on April 1 as China's President Xi Jongping looks on. (Photo by AFP)

Published: April 06, 2016 07:38 AM GMT
Updated: April 06, 2016 08:20 AM GMT

When Chinese authorities quietly released the pastor of China's largest state-approved Protestant church on March 31, the timing was no coincidence.

President Xi Jinping had met with U.S. counterpart Barack Obama hours earlier and both leaders were due to hold further talks the following day on the sidelines of a global nuclear dialogue in Washington D.C.

Gu Yuese's release came eight days after another prominent Christian figure was freed, the Protestant lawyer Zhang Kai, as both men appeared to get off lightly by Chinese standards after opposing a church cross demolition campaign in Zhejiang province. Authorities have removed more than 1,800 crosses so far.

Gu was accused of embezzlement and Zhang of endangering state security. That neither has been formally charged points to the enduring leverage the U.S. still wields with Beijing despite China's growing economic and geopolitical might — even as Xi takes China backward on rights.

Gu and Zhang posed serious challenges to the ruling Communist Party. Zhang gave legal advice to churches in Zhejiang to help rebuff provincial authorities trying to remove church crosses while Gu, as head of the massive Chongyi church and its 10,000 followers in Hangzhou, spoke out against the campaign.

Their prominent status put Gu and Zhang on the radar of campaign groups who have lobbied Western governments. Bob Fu, the Protestant minister and director of the U.S.-based Christian rights group China Aid, testified before a U.K. parliamentary committee the same day Zhang was freed.

The previous day Fu was due to speak at the European parliament on recent restrictions on religious rights in China — particularly in Zhejiang province — until terrorist attacks in the city forced organizers to suspend the event.

It is in the U.S. where Christian campaign groups have gained the most traction, and where Beijing most fears their influence.

Secretary of State John Kerry had previously called for Zhang's release amid campaigns in Europe and the U.S. aimed at securing his freedom. The day after he was released, U.S. presidential hopeful Marco Rubio joined fellow Republican congressman Chris Smith in name-checking Gu in a statement that called on China's leader to release more Christian detainees.

"We urge President Xi Jinping to reconsider his government's counterproductive approach to China's religious groups during the long-planned National Work Conference on Religion," said the statement in a reference to a delayed high-level meeting on China's religious policy due to be chaired by Xi.

In the lead up to Obama's meeting with China's president last week, the likes of Rubio and Fu are understood to have put pressure on the White House to speak up on religious rights, all the while trying to keep the names of those detained in the media. It appeared to work.

"We've learned from a China-based insider that the release of both human rights lawyer Zhang Kai and Gu are related to President Xi's visit to the U.S. for the nuclear summit," Fu said after Gu's release. "I want to thank all of those who worked tirelessly on related advocacy efforts that led to this diplomatic breakthrough."

Following talks between Obama and Xi, the White House used the word "rights" just once to describe the dialogue that had taken place. In the Chinese media, there was no such mention.

Although American news media was critical of Obama's soft public tone on rights, China still decided to release key Christian figures.

While these two cases represent a triumph for campaign groups, and demonstrate the U.S. government's enduring ability to win rights concessions from China, the release of Zhang and Gu is little more than symbolic.

Zhang said he was returning to his native Inner Mongolia following his release and hasn't been heard of since, presumably having been told to keep a low profile. Gu had already been stripped of his position in China's Christian hierarchy and remains under residential surveillance in his home in Hangzhou.

So while both go back to their families neither will return to a position to challenge Chinese authorities amid deteriorating religious rights.

In a further sign of how nervous the party remains of Chinese connecting on these issues with the U.S., female Christian rights lawyer Ni Yulan was prevented from flying out of China to the U.S. to collect an "International Women of Courage" award days before Obama met Xi.

Bu at least positive leverage can still be achieved with Beijing. In a world where previously critical Western governments including the United Kingdom and Italy have self-censored in the name of Chinese investment, the U.S. has shown China's Communist Party can still be nudged to do the right thing.

During a period in which good news has been slim for China's Christians, the releases of Zhang and Gu not only represent encouragement, but also show how religious groups can — possibly — fight their corner in the future.

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