The U.S. delegation led by Lorne Craner, assistant secretary of state for democracy, human rights and labor, will spend two of the official program’s four days in the predominantly Muslim region of Xinjiang, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.

“We will speak with the Chinese about human rights and democracy issues,” Craner told reporters Monday before the talks started.

“We’re hoping for a very productive session today and results in the coming weeks and in the New Year as well.”

U.S. officials declined to elaborate at the end of the meetings, which overran by an hour. A U.S. diplomat said earlier: “Issues in Xinjiang are an important focus of these talks.”

Craner was to travel Wednesday, December 18, to China’s westernmost region, to deliver a speech at Xinjiang University of Urumqi, the region’s capital, according to the U.S. embassy.

Xinjiang is a particularly sensitive issue in U.S. human rights diplomacy, as observers have accused China of using terror concerns as a pretext to suppress separatist activities as well as peaceful dissent.

Earlier in August, the U.S. government added a Muslim separatist group fighting Chinese rule in Xinjiang to its list of so-called “terrorist” organizations.

However, a Human Rights Watch report describes the various forms of repression and persecution suffered by the Muslims of Eastern Turkistan under Chinese rule.

According to the report the Chinese use extreme measures to stamp out any manifestations of religious sentiment among the Uighurs in the aftermath of September 11.

Examples of this are plentiful in Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and the U.S. Department of State’s reports.

These include, but are not limited to nighttime patrols of student dormitories to ensure no prayers are taking place, the banning of fasting during Ramadan, outlawing of Qur’an study meetings and religious schools, the curbing of mosque building, the identification and surveillance of religious leaders, and the banning of history books that do not conform to the “accepted” version of history, the reports said.

There is also “political education” that Imams are subjected to which is reportedly to provide them with “a clearer understanding of the Party’s ethnic and religious policies.”

Dilxat Rexiti, a spokesman for the East Turkestan Information Center, a German-based group which advocates rights for Xinjiang’s Uighur ethnic group, said he doubted concrete progress would be made.

“Dialogue in itself will not bring any improvement in the situation,” he said. “The only way is for the United States to put pressure on the Chinese government.”

The new round of rights talks comes as diplomacy between the United States and China has become unusually engaged.

U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, Assistant Secretary of State James Kelly and Admiral Thomas Fargo, commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, have all passed through Beijing in recent weeks.

“The general relationship and the general chemistry between the United States and China is improving,” said Jean-Pierre Cabestan, director of the Hong Kong-based French Center for Research on Contemporary China.

“Maybe the United States thinks the time is right to talk about human rights.”

But the top agenda items during the recent high-level U.S. visits - Iraq and North Korea - could weaken the current U.S. delegation’s position because Washington needs China’s support, some observers say.

As a veto-wielding member of the United Nations Security Council, China could become a key factor if the U.S. government was to move militarily against Iraq.

And as North Korea’s long-term ally, China will be indispensable in any solution of the crisis caused by Pyongyang's revelation that it has been involved in a secret nuclear program.
The U.S. delegation also includes Assistant Attorney General Ralph F. Boyd and John Hanford, the U.S. ambassador for international religious freedom.

Their Chinese interlocutors include Li Baodong, head of the foreign ministry’s international department; Nan Ying, a chief judge at the supreme court; and Du Zhongxing, a ranking justice ministry official.

The Information Center for Human Rights and Democracy, a Hong Kong rights group, urged Craner to inquire about the fate of three Chinese dissidents who went missing almost six months ago.