According to the Washington Post, some judges in Spain would like to prosecute Chinese officials for crimes unrelated to Spain.  They also want to go after officials in the U.S., Israel and other countries with a total of “16 international investigations into suspected cases of torture, genocide and crimes against humanity.”

The report states, “the judges have opened the cases by invoking a legal principle known as universal jurisdiction, which under Spanish law gives them the right to investigate serious human rights crimes anywhere in the world, even if there is no Spanish connection.”

The report also states there is serious opposition within the Spanish judiciary system and parliament.  Most likely, these cases will only serve to weaken diplomatic relations and not even go to trial.  But the fact that some Spanish judges feel this is their responsibility is a fascinating concept, called universal jurisdiction.

According to an essay by Henry Kissinger, “The doctrine of universal jurisdiction asserts that some crimes are so heinous that their perpetrators should not escape justice by invoking doctrines of sovereign immunity or the sacrosanct nature of national frontiers.”

What this says essentially is that when it comes to human rights, it is acceptable and even necessary to meddle in other countries’ internal affairs, especially if said countries are not able or willing to prosecute these cases themselves.

Spain’s legal authority to do this is dubious; universal jurisdiction is not universally accepted.  Also, their moral authority is questionable.  There were human rights abuses during the Spanish Civil War that were later overlooked for the purpose of “national reconciliation.” 

Spain may lack legal or moral authority, but I believe they do have a responsibility at the very least to point out crimes “so heinous that their perpetrators should not escape justice….”  If my government has tortured people in prison then I would hope the international community, including China, would put pressure on the American judicial system to investigate. 

As China grows into a world leader I hope it will one day be able to serve as a moral authority.  I’m sure politicians will be reluctant to point out crimes in other countries, but as China’s influence grows the expectations will grow.  The international community, especially the Western community, will expect it to lead through example and not just economics.  That is, development of social justice will have to influence economic development rather than the other way around. 

Of course, expectations are very low right now because China presently has no moral authority as a world leader.  But then again, neither does Spain.  It’s not a question of authority but responsibility.  So then, as a world leader, what are China’s responsibilities? 

At this time last year, just before the earthquake in Sichuan, the western media were busy filing reports on the international Olympic torch relay.  The protests surrounding this world wide journey played out very differently in domestic and foreign media. It made for a fascinating comparison of how perceptions are created based on facts reported in the media.

I had a chance to talk about the world’s perception of China with university students in the International Relations department of Renmin University recently.  I based our discussion on a survey (a link to the report can be found here) done by the BBC at the end of 2008. It is an annual survey, which has been reported by Southern Weekly here in Chinese.  It shows perceptions of different countries around the world.  People in Africa and Central America had a high opinion of Chinese influence.  More Europeans and North Americans saw China’s influence as negative than positive.  The highest opinion of Chinese influence by far, however, was of the Chinese themselves.  92% of respondents said it was positive. 

When I asked the students why they thought such a large gap in perception exists they talked about patriotic education, culture and history.  But of course media are the most obvious reason.  Insofar as it is their job to explain this country to their compatriots, the foreign media are China’s representatives to the world.

My conversation inevitably wound its way to the topic of biased reporting.  It seemed that almost all the students believed there is intentional bias against China.  However, when I asked them if they read foreign reports, no one raised their hands.  Without any facts, it seemed that they were the ones who were biased.  But this too is just a perception. 

At this point I mentioned that China and especially China’s youth gave an extremely bad impression last year because of the anger against CNN.  This is not because westerners have an affinity for CNN.  On the contrary, there are many (including myself) who have no love of 24 hour cable TV news channels.  It was simply that anger was displayed in such a virulent and non-constructive way that left consumers of western news that Chinese youth are immature and patriotic to a fault. 

The point I was trying to make is that news reports, no matter what country they are from, sometimes contain errors.  In some cases there is also bias.  The best way to address this is through letters or emails to the media outlet that point out the mistakes.  There is always a way to contact them through their websites.  If they are professional, editors and journalists will admit their mistakes make the corrections online.  Most media outlets I know of (including the ones I have worked for) are all willing to do this.  The students seemed shocked that this was an option.  Perhaps they assumed it wasn’t based on their experience with Chinese media.

If the youth of China had focused their anger with constructive remarks, not only would mistakes have been corrected, but westerners would have learned that even in anger relationships can still improve.  But even now instead of a website called “pro-ethics in journalism” there is a site called “anti-CNN.”  Instead of a movement to clean up bias and errors in journalism both foreign and domestic, there is a great disdain for foreign media by a group of people who are largely unfamiliar with it.  

Now that the anniversary of the Wenchuan earthquake is approaching, consumers of western news reports once again are getting a negative impression of China.  This is the time when facts need to be checked because a lot is at stake, including China’s reputation. 

Here is one article by Reuters and one by AP, both of which talk about the number of children who died in the earthquake.  They cite the government’s statistics (5,335 children dead or missing) but state that there are people who disagree.  They also state there has been very little media coverage of this issue within China, another fact that leaves a poor impression.

I encourage readers to check the facts in these reports.  If there are any errors at all regarding the reporting of deaths of children in the earthquake, please point them out to the people who are able to correct them.  After all, it is stories like this that most shape the perception of foreigners and facts tend to leave the deepest impression on what kind of country this is.