Bo Chi <chi@vlsi> (02/07/91)
* C h i n a N e w s D i g e s t *
(News General)
February 6, 1990
Table of Contents # of Lines
News Briefs ................................................................13
1. China Tries Second of Four Dissidents for Subversion ....................62
2. Gorbachev Appeals for Support to Keep Soviet Union Intact ...............29
3. Taiwan Premier Advises on Reunification with Mainland ...................44
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News Briefs ................................................................13
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From: chenh@ucs.indiana.edu
Source: Dow Jones New
- Iraq announces it is severing diplomatic ties with U.S., U.K., France,
Italy, Egypt and Saudi Arabia; U.K. says it has not been notified of break in
relations.
- Twenty-five Iraqi soldiers make their way across no-man"s land and
surrender to Saudi Arabian troops, Saudi spokesman says; says group includes
2 officers; total POWs now 842
- U.K. Royal Air Force says one-third of key bridges in Iraq have been
destroyed by allied air raids, and many more have been damaged
- Syrian ground troops take part in their first combat of war, Saudi Arabian
command says: after Iraqi soldiers fired rocket-propelled grenades, Syrian
artillery returned fire, forcing Iraqis to withdraw; no casualties reported.
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1. China Tries Second of Four Dissidents for Subversion ....................62
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From: Zuofeng Li < zuofeng@pollux.wustl.edu >
Source: UPI, Feb. 6, 1991
By SARAH LUBMAN
BEIJING -- China pushed ahead with the final stage of trials of dissident
intellectuals Wednesday, trying the second of four Tiananmen Spring activists
charged with the serious ``counterrevolutionary'' crime of subversion.
Physicist Liu Gang, 29, was scheduled to go on trial in the No. 1 courtroom
of the Beijing Intermediate Court, according to a brief notice posted outside
the building.
Heavy security around the court in downtown Beijing suggested the second
political trial in as many days had already begun. Legal scholar Chen Xiaoping
faced the court Tuesday on charges of plotting to subvert the government.
Uniformed and plainclothes police nervously tried to prevent Western reporters
from reading the latest notices announcing what the government calls
``public'' hearings.
Only a carefully selected handful of Chinese observers may attend the
sensitive political trials of dissidents accused of engineering the crushed
1989 pro-democracy movement. Foreign observers are banned outright from the
hearings.
Liu's trial brings to at least 35 the number of Tiananmen Spring dissidents
tried for political crimes, with 14 activists sentenced to up to seven years
in prison.
Most of the sentences announced by China's state-run media have been handed
down to well-known students and intellectuals.
Authorities have posted trial notices for at least one worker charged with
crimes linked to the democracy movement, but have not publicized the verdict.
Liu Gang faces a stiff sentence of ten years to life in prison, according to
Article 92 of China's criminal code.
Liu's alleged crime of plotting to subvert the government is one of the most
serious ``counterrevolutionary'' offenses in China and may carry the death
penalty in extreme cases.
Liu, who holds a graduate degree in physics from prestigious Beijing
University, is a determined activist who became interested in democratic ideas
from his early university days.
As an undergraduate at the Chinese University of Science and Technology in
Hefei, Liu was inspired by the bold views of Fang Lizhi, a professor who later
became China's most prominent dissident.
Liu participated in an earlier wave of student-led pro-democracy protests in
Beijing. He continued to speak out for political change, organizing on-campus
forums at which students would discuss controversial political ideas.
Liu was arrested shortly after the army's violent June 4, 1989, crackdown when
citizens recognized his face from a government ``most wanted'' list of 21
student leaders and turned him in.
Two intellectuals, economist Chen Ziming and editor Wang Juntao, also face
trial for subversion. The pair are likely to be harshly punished for their
alleged roles as ``black hands'' behind the democracy.
Chen and Wang are expected to stand trial as early as this week despite Wang's
current hospitalization for hepatitis, according to Chinese sources familiar
with the proceedings.
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2. Gorbachev Appeals for Support to Keep Soviet Union Intact ...............29
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From: Zuofeng Li < zuofeng@pollux.wustl.edu >
Source: UPI, Feb. 6, 1991
MOSCOW -- President Mikhail Gorbachev attacked the Baltic republics and other
separatists Wednesday and appealed in a national television address for public
support to keep the Soviet Union intact.
In the televised speech, Gorbachev said that support for maintaining the
Soviet Union as one country in a March 17 referendum was the only way the
nation could remain a superpower.
``Everyone should understand that this is ... a question of our common fate,''
Gorbachev said.
He accused Lithuania and Estonia -- which have scheduled their own votes on
independence and along with Latvia, Georgia and Armenia are refusing to
participate in the March 17 referendum -- of trying to prevent their people
from having the right to remain in the Soviet Union.
On Tuesday Gorbachev issued a decree invalidating Saturday's plebiscite on
independence in Lithuania and ordered that the republic instead participate
in the March 17 vote.
Lithuanian officials said they would go ahead with Saturday's vote, and
Estonian authorities said Wednesday they would also proceed with a March 3
referendum on independence.
All three Baltic republics -- annexed by the Soviet Union in 1940 under a
Hitler-Stalin pact -- declared independence from Moscow last spring. The other
12 Soviet republics have declared varying degrees of sovereignty in the past
year.
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3. Taiwan Premier Advises on Reunification with Mainland ...................44
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From: Zuofeng Li < zuofeng@pollux.wustl.edu >
Source: UPI, Feb. 6, 1991
TAIPEI, Taiwan -- Senior Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping has often stated that
the island of Taiwan will be returned to China before his death, but Taiwan's
premier, Hau Pei-tsun, advised Deng he probably won't see reunification.
Addressing visiting Japanese journalists Tuesday night, Hau, a former five-
star general who assumed the premiership in June, said reunification with the
communist mainland in the near-term is not likely.
Hau said that despite Taipei's intent to formally end the civil war with China
by May, relations between the two sides could not improve until Beijing took
steps to meet conditions outlined by President Lee Teng-hui in his inaugural
address in May. These include renunciation of the use of force against the
island and China's adoption of democracy and a free-market economy.
As long as the communists do not abandon the use of armed force, the state of
hostile relations between the two sides cannot change, Hau said Tuesday.
The premier said, however, that Taipei's policy of cautious detente, including
commercial and cultural exchanges, is intended to promote reunification in the
long-term and will continue as long as Taiwan's security and economic
development are not compromised.
When Lee pledged last year to end a more than four-decade Period of
Mobilization for the Suppression of the Rebellion -- and thus technically
terminate the state of war between Taiwan and China --many observers here said
the way had been paved for Taiwan's recognition of communist rule on the
mainland and ultimately for negotiations on Taiwan's future.
But comments by Hau and other high officials in recent weeks suggest Taipei
will continue to treat the Communist Party as a seditious organization rather
than a government after May and until Beijing makes significant concessions.
Taipei has rejected Beijing's proposed one country, two systems formula for
reunification, under which Taiwan would submit to mainland sovereignty but
retain a high degree of autonomy and even its own armed forces. Hau responded
last fall with a play on words calling for one country with a good system.
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