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October 29, 1997
Clinton, Jiang Agree to Create D.C.-Beijing Hotline
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By JOHN M. BRODER
ASHINGTON -- President Clinton and Chinese President Jiang Zemin agreed Tuesday night to establish a round-the-clock telephone line between Washington and Beijing as a concrete sign of warming relations between the two powers.
In a largely unscripted 90-minute meeting in the residential quarters of the White House, Clinton and Jiang began a two-day summit meeting intended to cement ties between the two leaders and to begin to address longstanding irritants in U.S.-Chinese diplomacy.
Clinton and Jiang, with their top security advisers, met in an intimate, informal setting in the Yellow Oval Room of the White House residence Tuesday night in an ice-breaking prelude to formal sessions Wednesday.
The session, which ended after 11 p.m. and included a 15-minute tour of the White House domestic quarters, touched on human rights, Tibet and Taiwan, according to U.S. officials. The talk included a lengthy philosophical discussion about the evolution of liberty in the United States and the different historical backgrounds of the two nations.
The meeting was "very direct and substantive," said Anne R. Luzzatto, a White House spokeswoman.
During the late evening session, Clinton served his guest orange juice and hors d'oeuvres and conducted an impromptu tour of his White House living quarters.
He showed Jiang a copy of the Gettysburg Address in President Abraham Lincoln's handwriting. The Chinese president immediately began reciting, in English, the speech's famous opening line, "Fourscore and seven years ago," Ms. Luzzatto said.
Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who met with Jiang earlier Tuesday evening at Blair House, said the talks would be "candid and comprehensive." She promised that the summit sessions would yield incremental but important agreements on a number of issues while addressing chronic irritants between Washington and Beijing, including trade and human rights.
Albright and national security adviser Samuel Berger attended the meeting Tuesday night, officials said. Jiang was accompanied by Qian Qichen, who serves as the Chinese deputy prime minister and foreign minister.
Jiang returns to the White House on Wednesday morning for a formal arrival ceremony, replete with martial fanfare and a 21-gun salute. The day ends with a state dinner in the White House East Room.
Neither side anticipates that the meetings will forever end the abiding mutual suspicion between Washington and Beijing. But, as one senior U.S. official put it, "the strategy is to have the two presidents create a rapport with which they can talk candidly about tough issues."
In advance of Wednesday's meetings, officials described an agreement to encourage the sale of U.S. technology to address China's gaping energy needs without worsening its severe environmental problems. It is intended to help China safely meet its energy demands and to give U.S. companies an edge against Japanese and other competitors vying for a share of the huge Chinese power-generation market.
The proposal, to which the Chinese have agreed, will allow the United States and industry officials to consult with Chinese ministries on matters like reducing coal-plant emissions, building more fuel-efficient cars, extending electricity to rural areas and cutting urban air pollution. All are potential bonanzas for American businesses.
An official document on the program is expected to be signed Wednesday.
Also Wednesday, Clinton is expected to certify that China had stopped supplying nuclear and weapons materials to Iran and Pakistan, clearing the way for American engineering and construction concerns to bid on lucrative Chinese nuclear power plant contracts.
Albright also announced Tuesday that three American religious leaders would meet with Chinese officials in Beijing to discuss suppression of religious liberties and free speech and other human rights problems.
She identified the leaders as the Rev. Don Argue, president of the National Association of Evangelicals; Archbishop Theodore E. McCarrick of the Newark, N.J., Catholic Archdiocese, and Rabbi Arthur Schneier, president of the Appeal of Conscience Foundation.
Albright stressed that while Clinton will raise concerns about human rights with Jiang, their meetings will strike more than one chord.
"We cannot have our relationship with China held hostage to any one single issue," Albright said. "I think it's absolutely essential that the American people understand the importance of pursuing a broad and multifaceted relationship with China."
She said the agenda included limiting the spread of weapons technology, broadening U.S.-Chinese military contacts, curbing global crime and addressing trade frictions.
Progress on all fronts requires consistent dialogue and cooperation, even when the nations disagree, Albright said, adding: "Engagement is not endorsement."
Jiang was officially welcomed at Andrews Air Force Base by Vice President Al Gore for the first U.S.-Chinese summit meeting since Chinese security forces opened fire on pro-democracy protesters in Tiananmen Square in Beijing in 1989.
Jiang, 71, an engineer who formerly served as mayor of booming Shanghai, descended from his Air China 747 into the late-afternoon sunlight, where he was met with full honors by the Vice President.
The Chinese leader, a self-described American history aficionado, arrived after a visit to the colonial village of Williamsburg, Va., where he donned a three-cornered hat and was greeted by actors portraying two of America's foremost apostles of democracy, Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry.
A few hundred yards away, a handful of protesters brandished signs reading, "Free Tibet" and "Human Rights Now."
The reaction in Williamsburg was a mild foretaste of a cacophony of protests Jiang will face in Washington. Hundreds of protesters were gathering Tuesday in Lafayette Park across the street from the White House and across from the Chinese Embassy near Dupont Circle, while members of Congress held a hearing on rights abuses in China. Jiang is scheduled to meet legislative leaders Thursday morning.
Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C., convened a hearing to listen to a group of Chinese dissidents who want Clinton to demand that Jiang release all political prisoners. But Helms, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said that his disapproval of Jiang's policies would not keep him from the state dinner at the White House on Wednesday night.
"I'm not going to thumb my nose at the guy, nor am I going to embrace him," Helms said. "I want him to understand that the American people are concerned about the dismal human-rights record of the People's Republic of China."
Ten members of Congress signed papers Tuesday "adopting" Chinese and Tibetan prisoners being held by China.
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