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Let Freedom Ring in Beijing

In a recent interview with The Post, Chinese President Jiang Zemin stated, "The theory of relativity worked out by Mr. Einstein for the natural sciences can, I believe, also be applied to politics. Both democracy and human rights are relative concepts and not absolute or universal."

Apparently, Jiang knows as little about physics as he does about human rights. The basic rule underlying Einstein's famous theory is that the physical laws governing the universe are indeed universal even if they may appear otherwise from different perspectives. Like the laws of physics, the basic rights of every human being to life, liberty, freedom of thought and expression are also immutable and universal.

Perhaps that is why so many physicists, including Fang Lizhi and Xu Liangying in China, as well as Andrei Sakharov, and even Einstein himself, became pioneering champions of universal human rights. The Chinese people, like any other, want, demand and deserve the rights that are inherently theirs.

The world rarely hears Chinese (or Tibetan) voices for democracy and human rights, because they have been totally suppressed by Jiang's government. According to his government's own statistics, at least 3,000 political prisoners or "counterrevolutionaries" are being held in Chinese prisons today. Human Rights in China believes this figure to be grossly underestimated as we have documented hundreds of cases in which dissidents have been tried on trumped-up criminal rather than political charges. In addition, the Chinese government routinely uses a nonjudicial method of administrative detention called "reeducation through labor" that allows it to send human rights activists and other citizens to labor camps, without trial, for up to three years. These prisoners do not appear in the Chinese government's statistics, nor do the hundreds of pro-democracy activists forced to live in exile.

Jiang has repeatedly stated, "Our purpose is to run our country according to rule by law." But "rule by law" and "rule of law" are not the same thing. True rule of law is a system whereby the people of a nation have a voice in formulating and enforcing the laws that govern them. What Jiang means by rule of law is imposing on citizens a law promulgated, enforced and arbitrarily interpreted to suit the interests of the ruling elites.

Jiang Zemin should know the difference; he is an expert on "rule by law." He came to power during the martial law that resulted in Chinese troops slaughtering innocent Chinese citizens during the 1989 Beijing Massacre. After declaring that the peaceful Tiananmen Square pro-democracy movement was a "counterrevolutionary riot," he used the law to round up and imprison at least 20,000 demonstrators and execute hundreds of them. In 1993 Jiang promulgated a State Security Law that conveniently gave him the power to throw outspoken pro-democracy advocates such as Wei Jingsheng, Wang Dan and scores of others into prison on charges of threatening the nation's security. He brushes off questions about these actions by saying they are "judicial matters" that he has no hand in. But in a system in which the judiciary is accountable to the ruling party, not to the people, rule by law is nothing more than a cleverly veiled phrase for dictatorship.

President Jiang often argues that by crushing voices calling for democracy, his government is ensuring stability and unity. Yet it is precisely the lack of respect for human rights and a legal system protecting individual rights that puts China in danger of becoming unstable. The rapid economic and social transition China is currently undergoing will be more difficult and violent unless fundamental political and civil liberties are available to the Chinese people so that they can participate in decisions that affect their lives.

In recent months, serious problems of unemployment, appalling factory work conditions and corruption have forced thousands of workers and citizens in dozens of Chinese industrial cities such as Mianyang, Zigong and Wuhan to take to the streets in protest. Without independent unions, a free press and other autonomous channels for voicing dissatisfaction in China, many of these spontaneous protests over layoffs and unpaid wages have escalated into violent conflicts between demonstrators and the police. Dozens of workers have been arrested, but suppression cannot make the core problems go away. Without a peaceful means for people to address them, these issues will eventually undermine the success of China's economic development.

This week Jiang Zemin makes carefully orchestrated stops in Williamsburg, Boston, Washington and Philadelphia -- cities that symbolize the very values of democracy and individual rights that Americans hold so dear but that Jiang denies the people of his own country. In China today, "dissidents" who, like Patrick Henry, Paul Revere, William Penn and Thomas Jefferson, demand freedom of speech, freedom of the press and freedom of assembly -- values that are fundamental to the prosperity and stability of the United States of America -- are systematically silenced either through imprisonment or exile. Let freedom ring in China.

The writer, a former astrophysicist, is executive director of the New York-based organization Human Rights in China.