China to open records relating to U.S. MIAs

[unhappycamper]

China to open records relating to U.S. MIAs
By Robert Burns - The Associated Press
Posted : Tuesday Feb 26, 2008 6:08:08 EST

WASHINGTON — China has agreed to a long-standing U.S. request for access to sensitive military records that Defense Department officials believe might resolve the fate of thousands of U.S. servicemen missing from the Korean War and other Cold War-era conflicts, a Pentagon official said Monday.

The arrangement is scheduled to be publicly announced Friday in Shanghai after a final set of talks to work out certain details, according to Larry Greer, spokesman for the Pentagon’s prisoner of war-missing in action (POW-MIA) office.

The deal marks a modest step forward for U.S.-China military relations, which have been strained in recent years, in part by sharp U.S. criticism of China’s military buildup. China has periodically cooperated with the Pentagon on matters related to the search for MIAs, but it has balked at repeated requests to open its military archives for documents of interest to the Pentagon.

Peter Rodman, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who dealt with the Chinese on the military archives issue when Donald H. Rumsfeld was defense secretary, said in an interview that the agreement is a positive step.

“It has special meaning to our military,” Rodman said, because it could answer lingering questions about the fate of servicemen whose families have waited for decades to learn more. Rodman said the significance of the deal will depend on exactly what China has agreed to provide and how it is done.


Rest of article at: http://www.navytimes.com/news/2008/02/ap_china_trooprecords_022508/