Reuters: US Panel: China Intensifies Crackdown on Religion (excerpt)

By Paul Grant

Monday April 30

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - China's violation of religious freedom has intensified, a U.S. panel said on Monday in a sharply worded report urging the United States to prod Beijing to ease its restrictions.

''The situation in China has grown worse in the past year,'' said Elliott Abrams, chairman of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom as it issued its second annual report.

The 188-page report also accused India, Indonesia, Russia, Pakistan, Nigeria, Iran, Sudan, Vietnam and North Korea of either directly violating religious freedoms, permitting local or regional governments to restrict freedoms or ignoring intercommunity violence.

Three of the nine panel members are appointed by the president and six by the congressional leadership.

The commission report, presented to President Bush, Secretary of State Colin Powell, and congressional leaders, had a list of nonbinding recommendations, including censuring China over human rights and opposing its bid to host the Olympics.

In China, the report said, the government has expanded its crackdown on unregistered religious groups, tightened control on official religious organizations, intensified its campaign against the Falun Gong spiritual movement and increased control over official Protestant and Catholic churches.

[]

The panel urged the U.S. government to try to persuade China to ease its grip on religious freedom. Until China loosens restrictions, the commission said, Washington should continue to sponsor a resolution to censure China at the U.N. Commission on Human Rights.

The commission also urged Washington to work to keep the Olympic movement from staging its games in China until it improves its religious-freedom and human-rights record.

The U.S. government, Abrams said, should make freedom of religion in China a higher priority.

''I think we would like to see a link between religious freedom and the bilateral relations with China,'' said Abrams, an assistant secretary of state in the Reagan administration.

[]