China opened an international conference on world human rights Tuesday, a sign of its growing confidence in a field where it has faced much criticism.
While not focused specifically on China, the two-day symposium reflected China's greater willingness to entertain discussions on rights issues.It also offered China an opportunity to promote its view that cultural, historical and economic differences between countries are bound to create arguments over human rights that should be discussed without confrontation.
"It is only natural that countries in the world do not have complete agreement on how to define, approach and realize human rights," Vice Premier Qian Qichen told the meeting. "No country's human rights situation is perfect."
More than 80 delegates from 27 countries attended the conference, sponsored by a government-backed society to mark the 50th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The Chinese delegation included government officials and academics but no known dissidents.
In a statement, Qin Yongmin, a dissident from southern China, attacked the meeting as an effort to "cheat international opinion."
British lawmaker and delegate Jeremy Corbyn said he planned to discuss individual human rights cases with Chinese officials, including that of imprisoned labor activist Liu Nianchun. He also said he hoped to discuss general concerns about Tibet, labor camps and religious freedom.
Corbyn said the symposium offered "an opportunity to at least raise these general issues." But he said that unless concrete acts were taken by China on human rights, the meeting "will be seen as window dressing."
The symposium follows a decision by the United States and the European Union this year to drop efforts to censure China at the U.N. Human Rights Commission.
The decision marked a victory for China after years of foreign criticism since the Chinese army crushed pro-democracy protests in Tiananmen Square in 1989.
Meanwhile, a human rights group said Tuesday that a Chinese activist for war reparations from Japan has been fired.
Tong Zeng, 42, was fired last week from his job as a researcher on aging at a government institute, the Hong Kong-based Information Center for Human Rights and Democratic Movement in China said.