The human rights situation in China has “deteriorated”, the Obama administration said, just days after blind legal activist Chen Guangcheng arrived in the US following his escape from unofficial house arrest in rural China.
The state department’s annual report on human rights lists China as one of the nations where conditions remain “extremely poor”, alongside countries such as Syria, Iran and North Korea.
The report this year was upbeat about political changes taking place in Myanmar – which the US government calls Burma – and talks about the “inspirational … yearning for change” that the Arab Spring has provoked in countries such as Tunisia, Egypt and Libya.