State Dept. to lawmakers: no trips to China

Monday, 9 April 2001 20:57 (ET)

State Dept. to lawmakers: no trips to China By ELI J. LAKE

WASHINGTON, April 9 (UPI) -- In a shift in the U.S. position towards China, the State Department has encouraged lawmakers to cancel planned trips there in light of the nine-day standoff with Beijing over a Navy spy plane and its crew, a senior state department official told UPI Monday.

This official noted that "most of the congressional delegations had decided not to go before consulting us. In all cases we made sure to say it was their decision, but when asked directly for advice we said it was probably not a good time to go." The official added that the advice hinged on the fact that diplomatic negotiations over the EP-3 surveillance plane and its 24 person crew remained unresolved.

In at least one case, Secretary of State Colin Powell personally advised a lawmaker leading a delegation against going to China, the official said.

This appears to represent a significant shift of the administration's position towards China. On April 5, White House spokesman Ari Fleischer told reporters, "The White House is not objecting to any trips that lawmakers have to China."

To date, separate congressional delegations led by Sens. Phil Gramm, R-Texas, Don Nichols, R-Ok., Richard Shelby R-Ala., and Rep. David Dreier. R-Calif. all cancelled trips to China. In addition a conference arranged by the Aspen Institute for 20 U.S. lawmakers in China has also been scuttled. All of them because of the current dispute over the EP-3 and its crew.

"It was Senator Shelby's thought that there would be nothing to discuss with Beijing when they were holding 24 American service men and service women," his spokeswoman Andrea Andrews told UPI.

"This was a low-profile delegation," said the Aspen Institute's spokesman, James Spiegelman. "Had this not happened during the course of the spy plane incident this would have gone on with very little fan fare."

The cancelled trips however may be only the tip of the iceberg in freezing U.S.-China relations. After a bitter congressional fight over Permanent Normal Trade Relations with China last year, some U.S. lawmakers that supported the bill are changing their minds. Because Beijing is not likely to gain full membership in the World Trade Organization in time, Congress may well have another bite at the China trade apple this year.

Last year PNTR passed the House by 237 votes to 197, so if only 20 votes flip this year the House could vote to reverse that position. House International Relations Committee chairman, Henry Hyde, R-Ill., who supported PNTR last year, changed his position last week in light of the spy plane row.

"So far the people who have been the sponsors of the legislation (to block PNTR) are people that are against normal trade relations with China," said John Foarde, the vice president of the U.S. China Business Council. "But if this crisis were to go on for a very long time it might persuade people to change their votes."

Foarde, a former Foreign Service officer who speaks Mandarin, is more concerned however at the Chinese response to the incident. He says his group's members comprised of U.S. businesses and professional firms, are "very concerned about the whole incident."

"If things continue to deteriorate the Chinese could slow down processing licenses, clearing things through customs and approving new investment applications," he said in an interview Monday. "We are not as strong as we would like to be on this. I think the business economic relationship can take some shocks, it didn't fold after the embassy bombings in 1999. But a glum solemn tenor in the bilateral political relationship is probably going to have some impact over time in the economic commercial relationship."

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Copyright 2001 by United Press International.

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-- Anonymous, April 09, 2001