Salmond has ‘a friendly word’ with Chinese over human rights
Alex Salmond said his human rights stance was more effective than protest from distance. Picture: Don Yap
FIRST Minister Alex Salmond has said he raised the contentious issue of China’s human rights record in a “friendly” way during his diplomatic trip to the country.
Mr Salmond said he brought up the subject of China’s use of the death penalty and allegations about the treatment of political prisoners during talks with ministers and officials from the Beijing government as part of the Scottish Government’s week-long trade mission.
He insisted his approach was better than choosing to “jump up and down from a distance”.
Scottish Labour MSP Jenny Marra, a leading human rights campaigner at Holyrood, said that Mr Salmond should make the issue a “priority” and that promoting business opportunities in China should not override human rights abuses in the country.
Shabnum Mustapha, programme director at Amnesty International Scotland, which briefed Mr Salmond about China’s record on capital punishment and the regime’s treatment of political prisoners, said that she had “confidence” that the First Minister had made an impact on the issues during the visit.
Mr Salmond, speaking on BBC Radio Scotland’s Good Morning Scotland programme, insisted that he had regularly raised the issue of human rights through the ideas of Scottish 18th-century economist Adam Smith, as he suggested that his approach over the issue was “improving the situation”.
He said: “Isn’t it more sensible to proceed in the way that I have been doing: not claiming that Scotland has the extraordinary political clout to instruct the Chinese how to conduct their affairs but taking the words of the Chinese leadership and their interest in the words of the Scottish Enlightenment, and raising that in a way that is both friendly but also has the objective of actually improving the situation, as opposed to jumping up and down from a distance and having no effect whatsoever?”
The First Minister also used a keynote speech to the party school of the Central Committee of the Communist Party in Beijing to talk about the need to protect developing countries from climate change caused by heavily industrialised nations.
Mr Salmond, who presented the school with a bronze of a sculpture of Adam Smith, said: “Climate justice is what is required – linking human rights and development, putting people at the heart of our economic system, and allowing all to share the burdens and benefits of climate change and its resolution, and to do so in an equitable and fair way.”
The First Minister added: “People in developing countries must have access to opportunities to adapt to the impacts of climate change, and not be told to ‘do as I say, not as I did’ by the rich and powerful developed countries.”
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HUMAN rights group Amnesty International has documented widespread violations in China, with an estimated 500,000 people in detention without charge or trial and millions unable to access the legal system.
China is the world’s leading executioner, imposing death sentences for what are sometimes non-violent crimes.
The death sentence is used after what Amnesty claims have been unfair trials. Two years ago, Briton Akmal Shaikh was killed by lethal injection after being convicted of drug smuggling. Other abuses highlighted include the repression of Tibetans, Uighurs and Mongolians.
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Comments
There are 120 comments to this article
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vistaero
Friday, December 9, 2011 at 12:39 PMComment removed by moderator
vistaero
Friday, December 9, 2011 at 12:38 PMComment removed by moderator
vistaero
Friday, December 9, 2011 at 12:36 PMComment removed by moderator
well informed
Thursday, December 8, 2011 at 09:10 AM106 What a long winded piece of utter sh*te! The only links to Megrahi release and oil deals are between Tory Bliar BP and Col Gadaffi. All well documented and in the public domain. This smear didnt wash the first time around and it aint going to wash this time either. Yous must be getting seriously desperate if you only have old dried up second hand made up mince left to throw. Whats wrong has your own polls got you so rattled than you can no longer hide the truth behind weighting them?
well informed
Thursday, December 8, 2011 at 09:03 AMHe should now have a friendly word with Cameron over his terrible human rights record and then Bliar, Brown, Thatcher, Major, Heath etc etc etc etc.....................................................................
Brit-free
Thursday, December 8, 2011 at 12:21 AMfree from these sad and lonely nutters .........and then as if on cue Vote No arrives ....ah well a long and entertaining evening awaits , ------baiting nutters -----its a sport ....not a blood sport , sadly, --- these days its mostly done in cyberspace ....tormenting poor sad souls that are too " special " to realise they are being baited .....wheres the sport in that you might ask ?
Brit-free
Thursday, December 8, 2011 at 12:12 AMoh no ! the scab picking fakey has arrived ...prepare to see crude personal abuse taken to an unreconstructed " new level " .... it is living proof that low brows can be taught rudimentary computer skills ....
Brit-free
Thursday, December 8, 2011 at 12:06 AM@108 if you want an answer ....i wouldnt bother ...mentally ill obsessives do not inhabit the same reality as we normal folk ....its the obsession tthat gives away their mental illness ...but , it is a symptom not the cause ....if the poor soul wasnt obsessing on the First Minister and his supposed " Naziism " ...it would be writing letters to celebrities and getting angry that they didnt recognise "something about him" or some such inexplicable tangent ....what you or I would regard as a " long " post becomes for it, a process that eventually leads to a justification ...he is ill ....it is a classic case
Vote 'NO'
Thursday, December 8, 2011 at 12:03 AM"honest debate" Lol
Vote 'NO'
Thursday, December 8, 2011 at 12:00 AM104 No. He didn't.
Vote 'NO'
Wednesday, December 7, 2011 at 11:58 PMSalmond strikes again! Self-importance knows no barrier where this man is concerned. And like Cameron in opposition on Europe, Salmond's loud voice in opposition on China's human rights abuses has now become a whisper.
Brit-free
Wednesday, December 7, 2011 at 11:55 PMmy what a lot of e-ink .....new lows ? what with the discovery last night that Charles Linksall , Tartancult and Captain Fantastic are just a multiple ....and now the thread has been invaded by an obsessive Salmond hater with too much time on his hands .....you have to question the direction this site is heading in ....fakeys trolls multiples .....where can a person find an honest debate ? free from these sad and lonely nutters
the wallace
Wednesday, December 7, 2011 at 11:47 PM106,I SEE YOU HAVENT ANSWERD MY QUESTION YA F****** MUPPET HOW IS HE A NAZI???
famous15
Wednesday, December 7, 2011 at 11:36 PMMr Salmond and the SNP clearly doing a first class job,given the level of unionist hysterical abuse, Roll on independence;we aint seen nuthin' yet!
vistaero
Wednesday, December 7, 2011 at 11:18 PMComment removed by moderator
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