Sarkozy appeals to China over dissidents

By Francois Murphy

PARIS (Reuters) - French President Nicolas Sarkozy sent a list of jailed dissidents to China on Thursday in a bid to draw attention to their plight, a day before he attends the Beijing Olympics despite criticism from rights activists.

Sarkozy, whose country holds the rotating European Union presidency, is due to represent the 27-nation bloc at the opening ceremony of the Games on Friday.

His attendance has angered rights groups and opposition politicians who accuse him of ignoring China's rights record in favour of business and political interests.

"The president has, in the name of the European Union, just had a list of cases of individual prisoners and human rights defenders handed over to the Chinese authorities," Foreign Ministry spokesman Romain Nadal told reporters.

But Sarkozy remained under fire for not pressing China harder on the issue of human rights.

He said earlier this year that he might not attend the Games because of China's handling of violence in Tibet and said his decision would depend on progress in talks between Beijing and representatives of Tibetan Buddhism's exiled spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama. He announced last month he would attend.

"He thinks he has a magic wand and that all of a sudden the Chinese will smile condescendingly and say: 'Yes, Mr President', and things will move forward. I don't think so," Daniel Cohn-Bendit, a Green European lawmaker, told website rue89.fr.

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