Not Enforcing Visa Ban Law on Those Who Violate Women's Rights in China a Gross Failure of the Obama Administration, says Smith

Contact: Jeff Sagnip, 202-225-3765; chrissmith.house.gov

WASHINGTON, May 1, 2015 /Standard Newswire/ -- At a hearing yesterday, Congressman Chris Smith (NJ-04) called on the Administration to use existing U.S. law to block entry into the U.S. for Chinese government officials responsible for implementing China's coercive, brutal population control policies.

In his testimony, blind activist and legal advocate, Chen Guangcheng calls China's violent population control efforts "genocide" and calls for a U.N. tribunal to "investigate crimes committed by the Communist regime in China…particularly [the] genocide" created by the 35 year enforcement of the "One-Child Policies."

"We should hold China to universal standards that apply to all states and that China itself claims to uphold," said Smith, chairman of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China and the chairman of the House panel that oversees international human rights. "As a nation, we must not turn a blind eye to the Chinese government's continuing acts of silencing dissent, committing crimes against its own people, and repressing its citizens' fundamental human rights. It has been a gross failure for the Obama Administration to fail to enforce existing law. We already have a law in place, the Admiral Nance and Meg Donovan Act which I authored, that will bar visas to Chinese officials, but unfortunately, it is not being used."

Congressman Smith's opening statement can be found here.

The hearing, entitled "Population Control in China: State-Sponsored Violence Against Women and Children," was held by the Congressional-Executive Commission on China (CECC), which Congressman Smith chairs, along with Senator Marco Rubio of Florida. It examined the economic and security problems associated with China's draconian "One-Child Policy," including an increased gender imbalance favoring males, making China a regional magnet for sex and bride trafficking of women from neighboring countries.  The hearing webcast can be viewed here.

The hearing included expert witnesses including Valerie Hudson from Texas A&M, Nicholas Eberstadt from the American Enterprise Institute, Reggie Littlejohn and Chai Ling, founders of the women's rights advocacy groups Women's Rights Without Frontiers and All Girls Allowed, respectively. The hearing also included Chinese human rights leader Chen Guangcheng, who was imprisoned in China for four years for his advocacy for women.

Said Congressman Smith, "China's one-child policy is state sponsored violence against women and children, despite small changes made last year to the policy, it remains coercive, it remains intrusive, and remains a threat to the birth of any girl child—tens of millions who were lost because families chose to have boys with the one child they were allowed to have. This is unacceptable, it is horrific, it is tragic, and it is wrong.  I urge the government to do what is right, not only of its people, but what is clearly in its own interest, and end this policy now."

The Congressional-Executive Commission on China, established by the U.S.-China Relations Act of 2000 as China prepared to enter the WTO, is mandated by law to monitor human rights, including worker rights, and the development of the rule of law in China. Its members are a bipartisan combination of Congress and White House appointees.