Amid rising tensions after L’affaire Spy balloon, a US congressional select committee that focuses on competition with China, held its first hearing., and focused its discussions on human rights, says a media report.

The meeting chaired by Representative Mike Gallagher, Republican, was attended by Chinese dissidents

The committee’s leaders consider the hearing, the first of what is expected to be many over the next two years under a Republican controlled House, to be part of the efforts to convince Americans to care about competing with China, as well as to “selectively decouple” the economies of the two countries, a report in Beijing News Net said.

In his opening remarks, Representative Raja Krishnamoorthi, the top Democrat on the select committee, said, “Over the last three decades, both Democrats and Republicans underestimated the CCP, and assumed that trade and investment would inevitably lead to democracy and greater security in the Indo-Pacific. Instead, the opposite happened.”

Despite the committee being bipartisan, some Democrats claimed that it could cause anti-Asian sentiment in the US. In response, Krishnamoorthi highlighted the need for bipartisanship regarding the issue, the report said.

US-China tensions have been heightened by China’s increasingly aggressive military stance against Taiwan, its support for Russia’s war against Ukraine, and the shooting down of the Chinese balloon suspected of spying over US territory on 4th February.

Beijing has denied that the balloon was a spy ship.###

https://www.beijingnews.net/news/273589611/us-house-china-select-committee-holds-first-meeting-on-human-rights