New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) has criticized the UN rights body chief’s call to China urging it to protect human rights in Tibet, Xinjiang, and across the country as a “weak performance,” says a report.
Sophie Richardson, former China director of HRW, decried UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk’s “shameful silence” on China’s crimes against humanity, Radio Free Asia (RFA) reported on March 4.
Türk was “staying shamefully silent on the Chinese government’s crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims in Xinjiang,” Richardson said in a press statement.
Türk’s address to the Human Rights Council in Geneva was “completely unmotivated by the agony and the pressure and the abuses that people across China are enduring,” Richardson added, RFA reported.
Earlier on the same day, Türk had urged China to implement the recommendations made by his office and other human rights bodies concerning laws, policies, and practices that violate fundamental rights, including in the Xinjiang and Tibet regions.
He cited an August 2022 report released by his predecessor Michelle Bachelet which had found that China’s detention of Uyghurs and other Turkic minorities in Xinjiang may constitute crimes against humanity.
Bachelet’s report made 13 recommendations to the Chinese government, including promptly releasing those detained against their will in detention camps.
China has categorically denied all accusations of any rights violations in Xinjiang and has always asserted that the alleged detention camps are vocational education and training centers.
The report had called on China to investigate allegations of human rights abuses at the facilities, including accusations of torture, sexual violence, forced labor, and deaths in custody.
China was also urged to release details about the location of Uyghurs in Xinjiang held incommunicado, establish safe means of communication for them, and allow them to travel so that families can be reunited.
Türk had said that his office aimed to continue dialogue with China on plans it announced during its recent Universal Periodic Review to adopt 30 new measures for human rights protection.
The recommendations included amendments to the criminal law and revisions of the criminal procedure law.
“I find it deeply worrying that he [Türk] seems to be relying on tools and tactics that are, I think, well established to be ineffective, particularly dialogues,” RFA reported.
“I think it’s also very worrying that he won’t even refer to his own office’s report on the Uyghur region and the conclusion that there may potentially be crimes against humanity committed by the Chinese government,” Richardson added.
Dolkun Isa, president of the World Uyghur Congress, welcomed Türk’s call but said it was not enough because the findings in Bachelet’s report have not yet been discussed at the Human Rights Council.
Despite China denying any rights violations in Xinjiang, Western nations have continued to raise alarms about continuing repression, arbitrary detentions, and enforced disappearances of Uyghurs and others.
During China’s Universal Periodic Review — a comprehensive review of its human rights record — at the Human Rights Council in January, Chinese government officials defended Beijing’s policies in Xinjiang.
Meanwhile, the U.S. representative to the United Nations condemned the country’s ongoing genocide and crimes against humanity there, RFA reported.
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