32. Welcomes recent moves by the PRC towards cross-Straits ties and the wish expressed that direct mail services, trade, air and shipping links across the Straits be activated as soon as possible in order to promote all types of exchanges and other confidence-building measures; 33. Notes that Taiwan eased restrictions on direct investment in the PRC in November 2001 and plans to take further liberalisation steps from early 2002, including the introduction of direct trading links; notes, however, that Beijing has yet to respond to the move; urges the PRC to respond favourably, particularly in view of the implementation of China's and Chinese Taipei's commitments following their accession to the WTO and in the interests of improving cross-Straits relations; 34. Urges the Commission to fulfil without delay its commitment to open an EU information office in Taipei; Human rights 35. Notes that China has signed and ratified the UN Covenants on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and urges China to ratify as well the UN Covenant on Civil and Political Rights without delay; 36. Endorses the human rights dialogue between the EU and China as a useful tool to engage China on this issue, but regrets that it has yet to lead to many tangible results and remains extremely concerned with the overall situation of human rights in China; consequently instructs its Human Rights Division to draw up an annual report on the development of human rights in China to be discussed by its competent committee, and instructs its competent committee to ensure that the Commission and the Council are properly represented and participate fully in the discussions on these reports; 37. Urges the Commission and the Member States to exert a more effective control on products coming from China, making clear to the Chinese authorities that the EU can in no way accept products coming from forced labour camps; calls on China to put an end to this practice; 38. Urges the Commission to propose at the next EU-China summit an increase in the number of joint ad hoc programmes aiming at fostering democracy and civil society, developing the rule of law and respect for human rights and supporting independent media; 39. Expresses its indignation at the increasingly high number of executions in China, and at the links to the supply of body parts for human transplantation, and demands that the Chinese Government abolish the death penalty, declare a moratorium on the execution of persons already sentenced to death, and accelerate judicial reforms in order to eliminate the use of torture and the violation of human rights in the country; furthermore condemns the 'widespread and systemic use of torture against political dissidents, Tibetan activists, migrant workers, people accused of violating the one-child-per-family policy', and religious, social and ethnic minorities, as documented in a February 2001 report from Amnesty International;