New best friends Clinton, Jiang rattle the region

New best friends Clinton, Jiang rattle the region

By John Gittings

HONG KONG: The energy and speed with which Bill Clinton and Jiang Zemin clinched their romance in Beijing has raised a confusion of well publicized hopes and less articulate fears.

A summit which had seemed to falter before it began was hailed by the participants as an instant success. But around Asia reactions to the U.S.-China euphoria have been more guarded as the region tries to interpret the mixed signals the summit sends out.

Taiwan heard bad news Tuesday when Clinton, taking part in a Shanghai radio phone-in, defined U.S. policy in terms more favorable to Beijing than he has previously used. But the Dalai Lama sees a positive signal in what the two presidents said about the possibility of negotiations regarding Tibet, during their sensationally televised debate on human rights last Saturday.

On Tuesday Clinton again praised China as a "force for stability" in coping with the Asian economic crisis; and China is regarded as having signed up to more active efforts to prevent nuclear proliferation.

But gloomy fears are being expressed in Tokyo about a new U.S.-China era and a Japan which is "passed by". And India has condemned the two presidents' agreement to tackle the security problem in South Asia as the hypocrisy of the nuclear haves -- and is reported to be planning to build a nuclear submarine with Russian aid.

Responding to Chinese hints that Taiwan remains the main obstacle to even better relations, Clinton endorsed a formula known as the "three nos", which includes an explicit statement that Washington does not support independence for Taiwan. The formula was absent in the joint statement after Jiang's visit to Washington last October, although it has been used by some U.S. officials.

On Tibet, Jiang said that negotiations were possible with the Dalai Lama if he recognized Tibet to be part of China and Taiwan as "a province of China". A planned trip by the Dalai to Taiwan was apparently canceled three weeks ago, suggesting that some form of negotiations may already be under way.

The long-term effect of the summit upon China internally is even harder to gauge than its impact upon international diplomacy. The meeting has thrown up vastly divergent analyses of whether it has changed everything or nothing at all.

Some, like the Hong Kong analyst Willy Lam, believe that Jiang has taken a big gamble by letting Clinton preach U.S. political ideals on Chinese soil. This is likely to speed up the development of a looser political atmosphere.

Other commentators go further still, predicting that the Chinese Communist Party's grip, once loosened, will not survive. Jiang is cast as a Mikhail Gorbachev.

The Clinton camp does not claim any such intention. On the contrary, Clinton is telling Jiang publicly and privately that the party's best chance of retaining power is to move on to "the right side of history" -- in partnership with a democratic and benevolent U.S.

But a few simple facts need to be restated and a note of caution sounded. The summit in Beijing last Saturday came after a very shaky start to the Clinton visit, including a formal U.S. protest against the Chinese harassment of dissidents in the town of Xian, where Clinton began his tour. This raises the question of whether Jiang is playing hard and soft at the same time, and what practical improvement can be expected on the ground.

Clinton's speech on Monday to Beijing University also needs to be seen in context: while arguing that human rights were universal, he avoided specifics that might upset his Chinese hosts. The speech as a whole was not unacceptable to the government -- yet even so, it was virtually ignored in Tuesday's official press. And there is little doubt that the students who put "tough" questions to Clinton were pre-selected.

Beijing has a great capacity to pre-arrange and control events that are apparently spontaneous. It is inconceivable that on a visit of this importance, the Xian authorities would have been left to decide whether local dissidents should be allowed to meet foreign journalists covering Clinton's tour. Jiang showed brazen cheek in claiming that he was not aware of the details.

Jiang has emerged this year as a man who does have some appreciation of the need for a gradual reform of China's political structure as well its economy, a process necessary both for its own sake and to secure a favorable climate abroad -- particularly in the U.S.

But there has been no progress in Chinese market liberalization to encourage the U.S. to assist in Beijing's entry to the World Trade Organization. And though trade was supposed to be central to the summit, the US$2 billion in business signed in Beijing includes as always some double-counting and orders that may not materialize.

The Chinese are more reticent than the Americans about discussing the long-term future of their new partnership, but both have been spurred on by the combined shock effect of the regional economic crisis and the nuclear tests in South Asia.

The question is not whether Jiang is a crypto-democrat, but what concessions he will make in order to achieve the grand partnership design -- and whether these may have unintended results internally if, for example, he is seen as going soft on Tibet.

Even so, the two presidents have set a new course that transcends trade and other problems. Neither can be sure whether it will peter out or move dramatically on, but it has already created shock waves in Asia.

-- Guardian News Service