China is demanding an apology from the United States government for the attempted defection of a blind Chinese dissident.
China can go jump in a lake, IF this is an official Chinese government demand. I’m not certain if this is a Chinese media outlet making the demand, or if Chinese government officials are demanding it. No U.S. apology is owed to China over this situation in either case.
Rather, China owes its own people an apology for treating its dissidents like this, to the point that they feel the need to flee to the safety of a foreign embassy to escape official Chinese government repression. That’s just wrong.
The U.S. government needs to account for what happened, though. Did a U.S. embassy official in China tell the dissident that Chinese officals were going to beat his wife to death if he didn’t leave the Embassy, as the dissident claims? Or is he trying to generate sympathy? What really happened?
This is a very troubling situation. He should never have been talked into leaving the protection of the U.S. Embassy; I’m not sure we’ve done right by him.
Any apology from the U.S. to China on this issue is unacceptable.
