China The Furious Flap over Fang Lizhi

By Scott MacLeod

Fang Lizhi was not exactly a household name outside China until he was invited to dine with President George Bush. Then a series of missteps turned a social occasion into a diplomatic cause celebre. Using crude police muscle, the Chinese government physically barred Fang, China's most famous dissident, from attending the Texas barbecue that Bush gave at the Great Wall Sheraton Hotel to salute Chinese dignitaries at the end of an otherwise friendly visit to Beijing. The invitation infuriated the Chinese government, Fang's manhandling offended the U.S., and the Bush Administration was left with egg foo yung on its face.

The Fang flap began innocently two weeks ago, when he received an elegantly engraved invitation from the U.S. embassy to attend Bush's brisket, beans and beer supper. Fang, an astrophysicist expelled from the Communist Party and fired from his job as a university vice president in 1987, was startled; by demanding democracy and calling socialism "the scourge of humanity in this century," the outspoken scientist has gone further than any other dissident in angering Chinese officials.

Some U.S. Congressmen had urged Bush to usher human rights to the forefront of the U.S. dialogue with China, as is the case with the Soviet Union. But White House officials acknowledged that Bush never raised the issue directly in his private talks with China's top leader, Deng Xiaoping, and Premier Li Peng. The Chinese did, though. Toward the end of a wide-ranging 90-minute conversation on Sunday afternoon, Communist Party General Secretary Zhao Ziyang told Bush that dissidents threatened to upset the social order, which would "provide a pretext for the turning back of ((economic)) reforms." American support for them, Zhao added bluntly, "will not be conducive to the relationship between China and the U.S." Rushing off to a television interview, Bush did not respond. Just a few hours later, Fang was herded away from the Sheraton by plainclothes police.

Bush sought to dispel the embarrassment of an affair that left him caught between placating both the offended Chinese and American critics who attacked the Administration for not sending an escort for Fang, or even holding a separate but highly visible meeting with dissidents. On his departure for Seoul, Bush expressed to Vice Premier Wu Xueqian his regret that Fang had been barred from the banquet and instructed Ambassador Winston Lord to follow up on the matter with the Foreign Ministry. The Chinese announced that they "resented" the U.S. decision to invite Fang to the dinner without consulting them. When an Administration official replied that the U.S. was under no obligation to do so, Beijing termed the remark "irresponsible."

Once the rhetoric subsided, a senior Administration official who was on the trip disclosed that the Chinese had been informed in advance that Fang would be invited to the banquet. Beijing expressed its disapproval to the U.S. embassy, which passed on the complaint to Washington, but somehow the message never reached the highest levels at the White House. "The communication in Washington," the official observed wryly, "is less than perfect." Whether the Administration would have removed Fang from the list in any event is another question. Says a U.S. official: "You cannot get into a bargaining situation over a guest list."

At the moment few experts foresee any lasting damage to Sino-American relations. "Human rights is an important element in our foreign policy," says a U.S. official, "but by no means the only element." But the Fang affair has succeeded, intentionally or not, in bringing the human rights issue to the fore in the West's dialogue with Beijing.

With reporting by Sandra Burton/Beijing and Michael Duffy/Washington