By David E. Sanger
November 9, 1999
Washington - After a long telephone call with President Jiang Zemin of China on Saturday night, President Clinton sent his trade representative and his top economic adviser to Beijing Monday. They will try to close a deal to bring China into the World Trade Organization in return for a broad opening of its markets to American-made goods. Clinton's speed in sending them suggests that the Administration now believes that an agreement may be within reach.
It would be one of the most important American accords with China since the resumption of diplomatic relations two decades ago. It would also give Clinton a long-sought foreign policy accomplishment: a claim to have helped integrate the world's most populous country into the global economy, putting it under the rule of international law with an accord that could also spur China's faltering economic reforms.
Monday, the White House would not publicly discuss Clinton's conversation with Jiang, and on Sunday White House officials even denied that it had taken place. Clinton has insisted on a veil of secrecy around the delicate talks. But one official close to the negotiations, insisting on anonymity, said Clinton and other top officials had had a hard time evaluating Jiang's intentions during the conversation on Saturday.
While the Chinese leader agreed to receive Clinton's delegation, it is unclear whether he is ready to overcome the political opposition in China to opening the country's markets -- including allowing American companies to invest heavily in telecommunications, finance and other Chinese industries. "Things didn't sound as positive as we would like," the official said. "It was kind of right down the middle, and so we decided that there was very little to lose in trying" to go and strike the deal. Another official said: "There seemed to have been enough there to make it worth the effort. But the fact is they don't know exactly what they are headed into."
In a previous telephone conversation with Jiang, on Oct. 16, Clinton offered to put together a "bottom line" offer, a description of what China must do to get into the trade group. Presumably that includes resolving existing disagreements on telecommunications, financial services, textiles and Washington's rights to impose sanctions unilaterally if it believes that China is dumping its exports in the United States. The last point is a critical one for Vice President Al Gore, who has been under tremendous pressure from American labor unions -- which have opposed a trade deal with China -- not to give up the right to slap punitive tariffs on low-cost Chinese steel, textiles and other products.
The enormously complex agreement would entail hundreds of pages of trade concessions by China. Clinton's team does not have much time to negotiate before the world's trade ministers gather in Seattle at the end of this month. That meeting gives Clinton some leverage, because if it is clear that China is about to join the trade organization, Beijing will be able to play a role in setting the agenda for the next global round of trade negotiations. But Clinton is under pressure too. The organization's legitimacy is reduced if one of the world's biggest trading nations is not included.
Clinton is clearly sensitive about the criticism that he missed a huge diplomatic moment with China in April, when Pime Minister Zhu Rongji arrived in Washington with an offer to open China's markets that impressed American business executives with its breadth and depth. Clinton's own advisers have said he was focused on other things at the time, notably the war over Kosovo, and feared that Congress would reject China's proposal. The President commented on that decision for the first time last week. "A lot of people have said we had an agreement in April and that we walked away from it because there was opposition from the American labor movement," he said. "I've read that a hundred times. That is absolutely not true."
Monday Clinton said little about his weekend decision to send Charlene Barshefsky, his trade representative, and Gene Sperling, who heads the National Economic Council and would ordinarily have spent the week in last-minute budget negotiations with Congress. Asked to rate the chances of striking a deal, the President said: "I don't know, but I hope so. Ambassador Barshefsky and Sperling have gone over there to work on it, and we're doing our best." Sending along Sperling may send two different political messages simultaneously, one to the Chinese and another to labor and other American opponents of the deal.
Chinese officials clearly seem to feel mistreated by the White House's handling of Prime Minister Zhu's visit in April, and they know that Sperling, along with Robert E. Rubin, who was then the Treasury Secretary, thought the deal could not be sold to Congress. Sperling was among those who advised Clinton to walk away from the deal in April. His appearance alongside Ms. Barshefsky -- who urged Clinton to accept the deal with some amendments -- is a sign that she and the White House are now on the same wavelength. More important, Sperling is more attuned to the mood of Congress and labor. "The thinking is that Gene's more inclined to protect Clinton and Gore politically," one of his associates said Monday.
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