WASHINGTON, Feb. 15 (UPI) — Republican presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz has called for the renaming of a plaza outside the Chinese embassy in Washington, D.C., after a Chinese Nobel peace laureate. But Beijing’s state media condemned the proposal, calling it an insult.
“The apparently provocative move intends to outrage and unsettle China,” China’s populist tabloid Global Times stated in an editorial Sunday, Radio Free Asia reported.
“But this is no big deal. In addition to anger, it will enable us to learn more about the [United States] from another perspective: The [United States] has big problems in abiding by the rules and keeping self-respect and its Congress acts so rashly.”
The condemnation comes days after the U.S. Senate had passed a bill to rename the plaza next to the Chinese embassy “Liu Xiaobo Plaza.”
In its news release issued Friday, the Senate stated that, “Detained in 2008, Dr. Liu continues to be unjustly imprisoned under the authority of [Chinese] President Xi Jinping.”
The bill is headed for the House of Representatives for consideration, according to the Senate.
But a White House spokesman said it’s likely President Obama’s advisers would recommend that he veto the bill, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Liu, a human rights activist who is serving an 11-year prison sentence in China, was charged for “incitement to subvert state power.”
Liu’s wife Liu Xia remains under house arrest.
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