Human Rights Issues in China & Russia

The issue of human rights is a problematic one with respect to both China and Russia. Centuries of human rights abuses have been maintained by governments in both countries. There mere mention of Tiananmen Square or Josef Stalin conjure up images of bloody, repressive regimes in which human rights are routinely abused by powerful and totalitarian leaders. The collapse of the former Soviet Union and both China's and Russia's economic need to become integrated with democratic institutions around the world have witnessed some progress against human rights abuses in each country. Nevertheless, recent actions by the governments of both China and Russia demonstrate that human rights abuses still routinely occur in each with the support of the respective governments. For example, in 1995 the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Center for Human Rights, proclaimed: "Human rights violations in the People's Republic of China (PRC) remain systematic and widespread. The Chinese government continues to suppress dissenting opinions and maintains political control over the legal system, resulting in an arbitrary and sometimes abusive judicial regime" (China, 1995, 1). In Russia, the history of human rights abuses is one of infamy and legend. In the midst of enormous economic, political, and social change, contemporary Russia is still the scene of heinous human rights abuses. The war in Chechnya witnessed the Russian army razing the capital town of

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e PRC police detained members of the media for interviewing Chinese dissidents and students. Those who break the guidelines restricting freedom of speech are dealt with harshly by the government: "Sanctions for infringements range from official criticism of the coverage to the demotion, firing or imprisonment of the individuals responsible and the closing or banning of the offending publication" (China, 1995, 2). One distinction between China and Russia is that Russia is crime-ridden and controlled by large numbers of Mafiosi which is not the case in China. During some human rights abuses, Russian leaders argue that those being violated are members of drug smuggling groups, hit men, or extortionists. Russia has argued the case that Chechnya is a nest of such types, a cancer on the Russian landscape. Despite such charges, there are many who disagree with such a portrait of the tiny state: "The notion that a tiny state of a little more than 1 million inhabitants directs most criminal activity, especially arms smuggling, throughout Russia is on its face absurd; the idea that this threat can be eliminated by wiping out a whole city and killing tens of thousands of innocent people is monstrous" (Brumberg, 1995, 4). With respect t

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