Thank you, Chair.
Thanks to our witnesses.
Some years ago a Hollywood movie came out, starring Tom Selleck, that was called High Road to China. I always remember one phrase that a gentleman in that movie said: the oxen are slow, but the earth is patient.
Perhaps that's exactly what China thought, from Beijing, that it was going to accomplish by just waiting this all out, and it didn't count on the explosion of technology and the influence or the exposure to western culture that has happened in the last 20 years.
Mr. Burton, you mentioned in your commentary that in 1998 Canada came forward with assistance after the declaration was signed, to help China discover or move towards some diplomatic or some more western thought in democracy. Could you tell us a little bit about what the objectives were? What did we accomplish, and is there anything there that we can go back to now in our discussions with China about human rights and what it agreed to do?