China

LifeNews.com, which describes itself as a news agency that brings "pro-life news to the pro-life community," has highlighted an important comment that Secretary Clinton made in her recent interview with the New York Times. In discussing women's rights, she said:

Obviously, there’s work to be done in both India and China, because the infanticide rate of girl babies is still overwhelmingly high, and unfortunately with technology, parents are able to use sonograms to determine the sex of a baby, and to abort girl children simply because they’d rather have a boy. And those are deeply set attitudes. But at the governmental level, there is a great deal of openness and commitment that I am seeing."

Clinton's comments on this deplorable practice are commendable, though she left out some nuance when she said parents do it "simply because they'd rather have a boy." Often, it's a matter of economics: Boys bring wealth into a family, and girls drain tons of money out. Sons earn more money and financially support their elderly parents in communities where nothing like Social Security exists. Meanwhile, in India, parents must pay enormous, financially crippling dowries when their daughters get married. Absolutely none of this morally justifies sex-selective abortion, but these are issues that must be addressed in order to eradicate this shameful practice.

(Obviously, other factors -- such as family and social pressure -- are at play, too. Sex-selective abortion in India has been found to occur at higher rates among more educated people, presumably because they're more likely to be able to afford an ultrasound exam and abortion.)

Photo: Joe Raedle/Getty Images

A roundup of Hillary Clinton news:

•It's official now: Secretary Clinton will be visiting seven African countries starting next week. She'll commence her trip in Kenya -- the birthplace of President Obama's father -- on Aug. 5 and continue on to South Africa, Angola, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Nigeria, Liberia, and Cape Verde. She'll also be meeting with the president of Somalia's transitional government while in Kenya.

•Clinton, above, continues today with the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue in Washington. Check out the Wall Street Journal op-ed that Clinton and U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner wrote about the talks.

•A Wall Street Journal editorial accuses Clinton of "pandering to dictators" for saying last week that if Burma releases Aung San Suu Kyi, it could open many opportunities, such as investment, for the country. The editorial did praise her for suggesting that ASEAN consider kicking out Burma.

•Audio of the BBC's interview with Clinton last week is posted online.

Photo: Alex Wong/Getty Images

•Secretary Clinton was interviewed by David Gregory for the full hour of Meet the Press yesterday, and she did an outstanding job. She answered each question clearly, intelligently, and -- of course -- diplomatically. For example, when asked whether she would be betraying the democracy movement in Iran by engaging and negotiating with the regime it aims to overthrow, Clinton responded:

We have negotiated with many governments who we did not believe represented the will of their people. Look at all the negotiations that went on with the Soviet Union. Look at the breakthrough and subsequent negotiations with communist China. That's what you do in diplomacy. You don't get to choose the people; that's up to the internal dynamics within a society. But clearly, we would hope better for the Iranian people. … Yet, we also know that whoever is in charge in Iran is going to be making decisions that will affect the security of the region and the world."

•Clinton also engaged in a bit of damage control after Vice President Joe Biden's eyebrow-raising comments that Russia was a country with a "withering economy" and was "clinging to something in the past that is not sustainable." Clinton told Gregory, "We view Russia as a great power." She added:

What we're seeing here is the beginning of the resetting of that relationship, which I have been deeply involved in. I will be co-chairing a presidential commission along with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. We'll be following up on what our two presidents said in Moscow. And the Russians know that, you know, we have continuing questions about some of their policies, and they have continuing questions about some of ours."

•Clinton, above, and U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner are leading the U.S. delegation at the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue today and tommorow in Washington. Clinton opened the talks by saying that China and the United States "are laying brick by brick the foundation of a stronger relationship" and that it is time to transition from "a multipolar world to a multipartner world."

•Clinton will be visiting Nigeria Aug. 10 to 12. She'll also be visiting four other African countries -- Kenya (the birthplace of President Obama's father), and tentatively Angola, Liberia, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo -- Dow Jones Newswires reports.

Photos, from top to bottom: Meet the Press, Alex Wong/Getty Images

Regarding the deadly riots in China's western Xinjiang region, home to the Muslim Uighur minority group, Secretary Clinton yesterday urged restraint, saying:

[W]e are deeply concerned over the reports of deaths and injuries from violence in Western China. We are trying to sort out, as best we can, the facts and circumstances from the region, and we’re calling on all sides to exercise restraint. We know there’s a long history of tension and discontent, but the most immediate matter is to bring the violence to a conclusion."

On Monday, Clinton "dropped by" a meeting between Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg and Chinese Deputy Foreign Minister Wu Dawei, according to State Department spokesman Ian Kelly. When asked during Monday's press briefing whether the riots were dicussed during the meeting, Kelly said, "I understand that it did come up," but said he did not have a "full readout" of what transpired.

Meanwhile, U.S. Reps. Bill Delahunt (D-Mass.) and Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.) wrote an open letter to Clinton stating, "The Chinese regime in Beijing should not be allowed to engage in another Tienanmen [sic] Square with impunity."

Photo: PETER PARKS/AFP/Getty Images

China has expressed "strong dissatisfaction and resolute opposition" to Secretary Clinton's statements marking the 20th anniversary of the military crackdown on the Tiananmen Square pro-democracy protesters. (In the photo above, the People's Liberation Army guards a street leading to Tiananmen Square on June 6, 1989, two days after the infamous crackdown.)

On June 3, Clinton called on the Chinese government to "provide a public accounting of those killed, detained or missing, both to learn and to heal." She also said China should "give the rule of law, protection of internationally-recognized human rights, and democratic development the same priority as it has given to economic reform."

In response, the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman criticized Clinton for "crudely meddling in Chinese domestic affairs." He also said, "We urge the United States to forsake its prejudices, correct its erroneous ways and avoid obstructing and damaging China-U.S. relations."

The Chinese government has never published a count of those who died. A New York Times article yesterday stated that hundreds died.

The bold tone of Clinton's remarks are a contrast to those she made in February, in which she seemed to downplay human rights as a priority.

Photo: MANUEL CENETA/AFP/Getty Images

Yesterday at a state banquet hosted by outgoing Salvadoran President Elías Antonio Saca, Secretary Clinton and Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou had a rare informal chat when they shared a table and Clinton made the first move in greeting him and shaking hands.

The United States and Taiwan have not had formal relations since the United States severed diplomatic ties in 1979 in order to normalize relations with the People's Republic of China. Perhaps in keeping with the absence of formal ties, the Taiwanese president addressed Secretary Clinton as "Mrs. Clinton" while introducing himself as "the president of Taiwan."

Later, Ma told Taiwanese media that the informal chat was typical of "courtesy encounters" that occur at diplomatic functions.

Photo: Thumbnail from Central News Agency-Taiwan

The Chicago Tribune reports today that Secretary Clinton's outspoken style is "raising eyebrows," a subject I touched upon in my post "Was Clinton too verbally hard on Pakistan?"

Some comments of hers that have stirred debate:

• In April 22, she said the Pakistani government was "abdicating" to the Taliban. (At the time, the Taliban was 60 miles from Islamabad, the Pakistani capital.) Her comments on Pakistan "really went over the top," Brian Katulis of the Center for American Progress told the Tribune.
• On April 30, she said North Korea's return to talks seems "implausible if not impossible."
• On May 1, she said that China, like Iran, has made "quite disturbing" gains in Latin America.

Basically, Clinton has been boldly telling it like it is when normally in the diplomacy world unpleasant facts aren't addressed with such candor. "She's saying the emperor has no clothes," L. Gordon Flake of the Maureen and Mike Mansfield Foundation told the Tribune. "She's saying the things that nobody else would say, but that 99 percent of the people in Washington agree with."

Clinton might be stating her views "undiplomatically," but perhaps such tough talk gets results. Regarding her comments on the Pakistani government, an unnamed State Department official told the Tribune "They weren't doing anything before she said that. Then after she said it, they suddenly were taking it pretty seriously, and met with greater success. … I think she got their attention."

So far, President Obama hasn't told Clinton to tone it down, but Condoleezza Rice's former speechwriter thinks the current secretary of state should hold her tongue.

Photo: Alex Wong/Getty Images

Secretary Clinton said on May 1 that Iran and China have made "quite disturbing" gains in Latin America. She asserted that while the Bush administration worked to isolate countries such as Cuba and Venezuela, Iran and China were hard at work cultivating "very strong economic and political connections."

Defending the Obama administration's strategy of reaching out to Cuba and Venezuela, Clinton warned, "I don't think in today's world -- where it's a multipolar world, where we are competing for attention and relationships with at least the Russians, the Chinese, the Iranians -- that it's in our interest to turn our backs on countries in our own hemisphere."

Is it believed that since the 1990s, Iranian-backed Hezbollah has had a base of operations and intelligence gathering in Venezuela. As for other Iranian activity in the Western Hemisphere, Clinton said (referring to the Nicaraguan capital), "The Iranians are building a huge embassy in Managua, and you can only imagine what it's for."

Clinton's negative remarks about Iran come at the same time that the Obama administration is trying to engage more with the country, an expert on Latin American politics told the Chicago Tribune. Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki definitely had a strong reaction. On TV this weekend, he said, "Clinton's statements are in direct contradiction with those of the U.S. president." He added, "At a time when even Obama admits that decades of U.S. interference and gunboat diplomacy in South America have led to so many unresolved issues, it does not make sense for Clinton to drag Iran into regional disputes."

Meanwhile, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is scheduled to visit Venezuela, Brazil, and Ecuador later this week. Might it no longer be in the United States' interest to turn its back on Venezuela and Cuba?

Photo: BEHROUZ MEHRI/AFP/Getty Images