E-mail updates
Follow on Twitter
Subscribe to RSS
Win Mcnamee / Getty Images
Actor Richard Gere, right, puts an arm around Chen Guangcheng after the Chinese dissident was awarded the Tom Lantos Human Rights Prize in Washington on Tuesday. Next to Chen is his wife, Yuan Weijing, and adjacent to her is Lantos' widow, Annette Lantos.
BEIJING — Blind Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng urged the United States to not put business interests ahead of Beijing's human rights abuses and to help end the Communist Party's "rule of thieves" at an awards ceremony in Washington, D.C., Tuesday.
"It is clearly difficult to shift attention away from issues of finance and the economy," Chen told the award ceremony's attendees in translated remarks read out in English by actor and noted Tibet advocate Richard Gere. "[But] remember that placing undue value on material life will cause a deficit in spiritual life."
The 41-year-old self-taught lawyer also urged the United States to hold fast to its founding principles such as democracy, human rights and freedom of speech when dealing with China.
Chen's words could well be making some American officials squirm. As the Chinese and U.S. economies become more interdependent, Beijing has applied pressure for the two countries to put aside human rights issues and focus on mutual business interests.
China is the United States' second-largest trading partner behind Canada, and growth has it poised to move into the top spot. Goods and services trade between the countries totaled $539 billion in 2011, according to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative.
Chen is best known for his daring nighttime escape from 19 months of house detention in his native Shandong province in April. Despite breaking his leg during his dash for freedom, he managed to travel some 300 miles to Beijing, where he sought refuge at the U.S. Embassy.
His escape to U.S. custody sparked a diplomatic maelstrom that eventually led to his negotiated release from the embassy to a Beijing hospital. Chen and his family were later granted permission to travel to New York University, where he could continue his legal studies out of the Chinese media spotlight.
Blind social activist Chen Guangcheng is starting a new life of freedom in the U.S. NBC's Michelle Franzen reports.
Acquaintances 'have been threatened'
Chen accepted the Tom Lantos Human Rights Prize, named after the only Holocaust survivor to have served in the U.S. Congress. Lantos' background had a "profound resonance" in his heart as he remembered his experience, that of his relatives in China and that of other human rights advocates still in detention, Chen said.
"Recently, many friends and neighbors who I have been in touch with by phone have been taken into custody by the authorities for questioning," Chen said. "They have been threatened and made to describe what our conversations have been about."
Chen's nephew Chen Kegui was sentenced last month to three years in prison after he was found guilty of assaulting local officials with a knife. The family says that officials barged into Chen Kegui's home and that he had been acting in self-defense.
In sheltering Chen and helping to negotiate his exit to New York, the U.S. government outraged Beijing, which roundly rejects foreign involvement in its domestic affairs.
Chen's frequent speeches and interviews in the United States regularly make news among China watchers and human rights advocates, but in China his words are blocked and censored.
On China's popular Twitter-like service, Weibo, Chen's name has long been blocked and mention of his award Tuesday generated no comments.
Beijing is likely to have bristled at Chen receiving an American peace prize. State media gave no attention to his award and the Foreign Ministry did not issue a statement on it.
Leave a Comment:
Why is the media downplaying the fact that this "human rights' activist" has concentrated almost entirely on opposing China's forced abortions and population control laws?
You can believe in the right of a woman to control her own body and also believe in free speech, michael. I myself strongly oppose governmental interference in my personal life, but I support the right of anti-abortionists to express their views.
And this lawyer is against forced abortion and his government controlling women's wombs. I don't know any pro-choice supporters who would support forced abortion. Forced abortion is as appalling as forcing a woman to endure a pregnancy no matter what the circumstance.
China now owns a part of America---33% of oil and natural gas rights in Colorado and Wyoming--800,000 acres involved-Sold to China's CN00C Ltd-- by Chesapeake Energy Corp--also China bought all oil rights owned by the Nexon Corp--oil right in Canada and the Gulf of Mexico
Yep. So we better play nice to them or else.
The U.S. wants to earn points by showing token support for a Chinese "human rights activist" but does not want to focus on the fact that the man is fiercely opposed to abortion and population control laws. We can expect the Chinese government and media to deceive their people since they are Communist, but we should not expect or tolerate such deceptive silence here in the U.S.!
If I failed to make it clear, I join him in opposing forced abortions and population control laws. Chen is a pro-life hero, and I'm mocking thehypocricy of the American political establishment and Hollywood types sucking up to him while simultaneously working against everything he stands for.
I haven't heard of anyone here working against forced abortion laws... as the US has none.
You been drinking the kool-aid?
I'm confused as to the nature of Human Rights. When you are not allowed to make basic choices about your own family, is that not human rights? When you are not allowed to think, comment or even speak unless it agrees with the "Party", is that not human rights? My guess is that you agree with "Population control laws", One lost freedom... Do you agree with "Gun control laws"? Second freedom lost. Give away your freedoms and you become the mindless hoards of humanity that will inevitably cause our society to become extinct...
At least you are Pro-Choice Miyoko Miller, one gained freedom. However, with gun control, do you agree that mass murders should not be allowed to carry guns? What about the merely criminally insane, are you willing to take away freedoms from those people?
Yes, your confusion is obvious. Murdering your own children is more than a "bad choice" and it surely not a human right. And it certainly not the right of a government to abduct women and force them to endure abortions and sterilizations in the name of population control. The most basic human rights involve living and doing so in a way that is natural to one's species, including making more lives. Your concept of freedom is sociopathic.
I suspect micahel elohim is a jesus freak whose comments here are just barely not vague enough to let you know he is another anti-abortionist.
Chen Guangcheng is a agent of the goverment of China or is he just looking for a free ride at the expense of the United Stated tax payer-----human rights in China---What about abuses in the state of Florida----
IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT IN AND FOR THE MIDDLE DISTRICT OF FLORIDA
CASE NO. 6:09-CV-0134-28-KRS-----Judge John Antoon, II
SONS OF CONFEDERATE VETERANS--FLORIDA DIVISION,INC.,a Florida corperation, & JOHN W.ADAMS
VS
STATE OF FLORIDA
This is concerning the SCV-being issued a specialty car tag--proceeds going to fix up Civil War grave sites--the tat has never been issued--sad---what about right of Florida citizens
What about the human right violations at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo.
How about the Human Right violations at the World Trade Center on 9/11?
I think he is aking the wrong party "to help end the Communist Party's "rule of thieves" :) It's like asking a lion to convince a tiger to become vegetarian!
The comments on this thread show that many Americans have no understanding of "human rights". We have people who consider it a "human right" to murder an innocent baby in the womb rather than recognizing life itself as the fundamental human right. We have people wetting themselves over mass-murdering enemy combatant terrorists being slapped around and "tortured" with loud rock music, or racially insensitive license plates in Florida. Perhaps Chen came to the wrong country. America is obviously on the same route as China, just at a slower pace.
Ah, my prediction was right, you are an anti-abportionist!
Now let me educate you, abortion does not "murder babies." Here, follow the arrows:
Zygote -> Embryo -> Fetus -> Baby
See? A doctor can help you abort a fetus, not kill a baby. I know science is hard and it's not exactly part of the bible, but give it a shot :)
The chinese are mad coz they cannot find a single american who would defect to china and proclaim how terrible the condition in the US and how china under communist party is the most heavenly place on earth to live and prosper.
"defect"? You are living in the past, Yus, this isn't the Cold War era anymore. There are tens of thousands of Americans living and working (and many prospering) in China.
"defect"? You are living in the past, Yus, this isn't the Cold War era anymore. There are tens of thousands of Americans living and working (and many prospering) in China.
(sorry for the duplication, a problem with the comment system....)
The United States should have never started trading with China.Chinese citizens do not have freedom of speech.they can't live in their homes safely because Chinese officials don't need a search warrant to hound harass,beat and imprison people for no good reason.I am wishing this man and hi wife a healthy,happy and successful life in the United States of America.I welcome them.
Let us not forget, cleaning lady, that all this trade with China came about because AMERICAN companies moved their manufacturing there in order to make more money of their own citizens. I remember back in the day when Walmart was proud to say that they carried almost all American products. Now Walmart is one of the prime instigators and purveyors of Chinese-made products which have forced the layoffs of millions of American workers.
They were child killers--woman killers---men killers--They were Muslims--they raped the people they captured---sometime they raped with a stick---the muslim way---if somebody does not like America---leave
still have some issues to address?
.
Economics and human rights, in the US you're allowed to aid terrorists financially if you have enough money. How's that for money and human rights.
Our gov. is not much better.....they too control and sensor the media as well to look good. The us has been doing this back in ww2..we just have gottenmuch better at it over the years. don't fool your self. If you cant stop the info...you put misinformation so you can't tell what is real and what is not. At leaste we can still publicly bitch about it, for now.
Maybe the reason the Chinese are silent is because no one has ever heard of this irrelevant award? Even the Nobel Peace Prize has become a joke.
navy,
more like the Great Firewall of China is doing its job and censoring out everything to do with this event. China's government will not say anything because that would stir the pot.
Totalitarian rule, is corruption.
Before we worry about China's "rule of thieves" we should probably worry about our own first............
This administration has stolen more form our grandchildren than anyone in history......... they will still be paying for our debt when the sun burns out.......................
I ageee we have way to much debt but compared to the GDP we have less debt now than we did after WW2
Money trumps everything!
I'm sorry, but Richard Gere needs to find something new. This guy probably has never been to China. He drives me crazy.
Of course China is silent... because it is meaningless.
It is out of the actions of the ignorant, like Richard Gere, that these stories are in the news. Every single person that claims the government has something against them, in the US, are considered nutcases, while in China they are "dissidents".
While it is true that there are true dissidents in China, the likes of this man and Ai Weiwei, are nothing more than grabbing for attention - period.
To believe that this man is a dissident, you would have to believe that there are constant forced abortion being done at the hands of the Chinese government - which is a complete falsehood. All they are doing is perpetuating the western misconception of the One Child Policy to vilify the Chinese government.
Look, you don't need to MAKE STUFF UP to vilify them. I'm not defending the Chinese government, not at all - but using misconceptions and complete falsehoods to do it... is just childish and underhanded.
You have Richard Gere, a major supporter of the DL as being some supporter of peace and freedom - WHAT? He is nothing but a long line of theocratic, suppressive leaders. And while we can say "the lesser of two evils", he is still evil.
VILIFY the CPC - but do it over things such as the obvious suppression of human rights: Censorship, forced demolition of homes, black jails... there are enough examples of this to keep you busy for a lifetime. There is no need to grab on to the latest fake dissident.
Heck, I was kicked out of China once for posting things on my blog - does that make me a dissident?
Enough of all this nonsense. With the vast population of China (4 x of USA's) something really has to be done which the government is doing. Actually this should be thought of by any sensible citizen for the good of the world and not for one's selfishness. Has anybody thought of what's gonna happen if the world has run out of food source? (Remenber Soylent Green, the movie)? Kudos to the government for "1 child policy in China" - so that you & I outside of China can make more babies (octomum, take note) at the expense of others and also burden our government and the taxpayers. Human Rights violation? Enought already - look at our own backyard and stop pointing fingers and making noises.
All the lives of the US men and women who die in vietnam. Who were sent to fight the spread of communism. The US has open trade today with the same communism goverment. What would you tell the family members they die for? would you say for the US economy? The US promotes democracy in the middle east and other parts of the world. But because RED china has money to buy US debt. now the US is saying we were wrong the communis are not bad. they are our friends. for me is says the one single thing that drives the US is greed of monney. if you are a poor country are have nouthing the US wants. you will not have to worry about the US. IT will not bother are interfere with its goverment. and on the policy of one child like china. i do agree with force sterilization for the ones who cant feed what they birth. who get a cheack for each of the babys. that is the only way to controll it. do you think these people would respect this law in the US.