For Australians who are uneasy about China's use of the death penalty, John Stanhope is the man of the moment. Mr Stanhope is the chief minister of the Australian Capital Territory, which encompasses Canberra. Last year he refused to provide evidence to Beijing to help it prosecute one of its citizens for murder - unless the mainland assured him that the death penalty would not be used in the case. But Australia and China signed a treaty on mutual assistance in criminal matters in April last year. It has yet to become operative, but Mr Stanhope, and others who want to protect Chinese nationals from the death penalty, could now find that they are helpless to do anything about it, except to write lame protest letters to Chinese authorities. The case in which Mr Stanhope became involved concerned Zhang Long, a Chinese national, who lived in Canberra with his girlfriend, Zhang Hong-jie. Zhang strangled Hong-jie during a fight in 2004 in Canberra, and after he confessed this to Australian and Chinese authorities, he was arrested in China in May 2005. Beijing wants to try Zhang for murder and has asked Canberra for help in gathering evidence. Because Zhang is charged with murder, he would face the death penalty if convicted. But Mr Stanhope refused to co-operate with Canberra's request. He said that unless he received a written undertaking from the Chinese that they would not apply the death penalty to Zhang, his police force - which investigated Hong-jie's death - would not hand over evidence to their Chinese counterparts. Finally, in November, Mr Stanhope won out. Beijing said it was ready to comply: it would spare Zhang's life if he were found guilty. But now that China and Australia have signed the treaty on mutual assistance, it is questionable whether Chinese nationals, or Australians arrested in mainland China on serious criminal charges, could be saved from the death penalty as Zhang apparently has been. The new treaty creates formal processes to enable the two countries to assist each other in investigations and prosecutions of serious crimes like terrorism, fraud, money laundering and people trafficking. China's death penalty can be applied to all these offences. Campaigners against the death penalty in Australia fault the treaty for exposing nationals of both countries to execution if convicted in mainland China. Vic Adams, of Civil Liberties Australia, has written: 'It is entirely possible that an Australian will face execution in China for a crime which would attract no more than several years' jail in Australia.' Mr Adams is disturbed that there is no specific mention of the death penalty and Australia's opposition to it in the main text of the treaty. Instead, it is relegated to an ancillary document, and merely notes both countries' positions on the matter. A parliamentary committee that looked at the treaty last year is not so alarmed. Its members say the treaty reportedly contains a general clause allowing Canberra to refuse a Chinese request for assistance in an investigation on human rights grounds. But is that enough? History is littered with examples of nations sacrificing individuals' human rights when they find it expedient to do so. And there is an unfortunate tendency for democratic countries to separate their human rights concerns from their commercial and strategic dealings with China. Time will tell if that is the case here. Greg Barns is a political commentator in Australia and a former Australian government adviser
