The UN released its Xinjiang report
detailing China’s human rights abuses.
Some say this is a victory…
…for China
Welcome to China Uncensored. I’m Chris Chappell.
The UN human rights office finally released its report on China’s human rights abuses in Xinjiang.
“To China’s fury.”
Seriously, the media need to stop using headlines like that. This is just feeding
into Chinese propaganda to get us to fear and appease the Chinese Communist Party.
The Communist Party is like a two-year-old who’s figured out
they can get anything they want as long as they start kicking and screaming.
Works every time.
Anyway, the UN report documents widespread human rights abuses
against Uyghurs and other minorities in Xinjiang.
This comes as a bit of surprise. UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet
isn’t someone people thought had the guts to even publish the Xinjiang report.
Bachelet “repeatedly postponed the report’s release with little explanation—baffling
diplomats, rights advocates and even some of her own staff members.”
The report had been ready for months, but Bachelet had resisted calls to publish it,
citing her wish to travel to Xinjiang first.
And when she did finally travel there in May this year, she played right into the
Chinese regime’s hands by going along with its planned tour. She posed with Xi Jinping’s book,
and even used phrases straight out of state-run propaganda.
“Poverty alleviation and the eradication of extreme poverty, 10 years ahead of its target
date, are tremendous achievements of China.”
Even just a few days before the report’s publication,
Bachelet said she might not see the report go through before the end of her term.
But in the end she did. The 45-page report was published “just minutes” before she stepped down.
Talk about convenient timing. Must be because she was swamped with so much
work, and not because she put it off to literally the absolute very last minute.
This is like turning in your final English paper as you walk across the graduation stage.
But now the report is out, and Bachelet doesn’t have to deal with the fallout herself.
The report confirms a lot of what we’ve already known over the years.
It includes evidence that China is using concentration camps,
which it calls “vocational education and training centers” to detain and torture
people. It also documents China’s use of national security laws to deprive people of liberty,
invade their privacy, use forced labor, destroy Uyghur language and culture, and more.
It even sheds light on sexual abuse, including using rape as a form of torture.
Again, nothing *I* haven’t been repeatedly saying on China Uncensored for years
and years. But for some reason people respect it more when it comes from the UN.
The best thing about the UN report is that it documents a lot of the
human rights violations that the Chinese Communist Party has repeatedly denied.
The UN says there’s “credible” evidence of crimes.
And says outright that “serious human rights violations” have been committed in Xinjiang.
But it only goes so far.
The UN report only says that the Chinese Communist Party’s actions
“may” constitute crimes against humanity.
And it never mentions genocide. A word that’s been used by the US and other countries.
It does point out how there have been instances of forced sterilization,
and how the number of Uyghur births has decreased compared to the rest of China.
But it never mentions how China’s Xinjiang policy *explicitly*
seeks to limit Uyghur births. That is the most damning evidence of genocide there is.
And finally, to fix the problem, the UN pretty much just asks the Chinese
government to take steps to release detained people, review its national security policies,
investigate human rights abuses, and keep engaging with international organizations.
So it acts like the Chinese regime needs to “investigate” the human rights violations,
like they weren’t the ones that ordered them in the first place.
I’m sure the Chinese Communist Party is going to get right on that investigation.
And they will find themselves innocent.
In other words, the UN is going to do absolutely nothing to actually solve the problem.
That’s why some groups call the report’s release a victory for Beijing.
I’ll explain more after the break.
Welcome back.
The UN’s Xinjiang human rights report goes
soft on the Chinese Communist Party. And that might be because the human rights office
gave the Chinese Communist Party a role in editing its Xinjiang report.
“Beijing has had this report for some time. Bachelet said they received ‘big numbers of facts’
from Beijing, which they needed to review and decide ‘if appropriate to include’ in the report.
Bachelet said this was standard procedure for her office.
They seriously trust the Communist Party to give facts? That’s like
trusting Bill Cosby on how to treat women. Politico reports that, “Bachelet gave the
report to China for a preview, and even on [the day of publication] the team
was still busy rewriting part of it to accommodate some of Beijing’s version.”
That sounds pretty shady. But I guess we can’t judge unless
we know what was actually changed in the report.
“According to one diplomat, the section on forced sterilization was watered down during the final
hours. The topic is particularly sensitive as this could have given rise to claims of genocide,
which Beijing has battled to dismiss.”
Ok, now I’m judging. I’m judging hard.
And so are human rights groups. Many rights groups are understandably
upset that the UN is watering down its language and making no mention of genocide in its report.
Some call it “a final insult to Uyghur survivors”...
and a victory for Beijing.
According to the prime minister of the East Turkistan Government in Exile , “It’s a victory
for China because the ongoing genocide and other crimes… against Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples
were watered down to mere ‘human rights violations’
to accommodate China and prevent the UN’s Genocide Convention from being formally applied.”
Sir Geoffery Nice ran the independent Uyghur Tribunal
that found that China was committing genocide in Xinjiang.
He warns that “This [UN] report could be dangerous in the long run
if it allows countries… to say something like ‘while things in Xinjiang are
less than ideal, they have not reached a level requiring international intervention.’”
“Those states could then do nothing, expressing hope or even belief
that the [People’s Republic of China] would have taken note of the report
and would start acting with more regard to human rights.”
China mounted a year-long pressure campaign to stop the UN human rights
office from releasing this report. They were ultimately unsuccessful.
But they got the next best thing, which was to scare the UN into weakening the report.
The Chinese regime essentially got the UN to do its bidding, when the UN should have been
exposing massive human rights abuses in a way that could have actual consequences.
That being said, getting this report out there is...better than nothing? I guess?
Maybe? At least there’s some official UN record of what’s happening—even if it’s very watered down.
And since the Party had an advance copy of the UN report,
they had this 121-page rebuttal ready to go. To a 45-page report. Always be prepared.
And now it’s time for me to answer a question from a member of the China Uncensored 50-Cent Army.
These are the fans who support us directly—through contributing
on either Patreon or Locals. Today’s question comes from...
Unpotatoed Salmon on Locals. “What would a post-fall China look like?
What nations would come in to take land in China? What would former ccp members do, or the military,
now that the ccp has fallen to ruin in this scenario?”
Good question.
In the best case scenario, after the fall of the Chinese Communist Party,
China will have a free and democratic government like Taiwan. Maybe the Taiwan government will take
part in this, maybe they won’t. But clearly it’s possible to have a Chinese democracy.
As for other countries coming in to take land, that’s a tricky one.
Since the first unification of China more than two thousand years ago,
China’s borders have constantly shifted. Some places have always been part of the
core China—cities like Beijing and Xi’an and Nanjing. Other places have not, like Tibet
and Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia. And then there’s Russia, which we know is always hungry
for more territory. So honestly, no one really knows how those borders are going to play out.
As for former CCP members, probably a lot of officials will be put on trial
for crimes against humanity. There are millions of them who’ve been directly
involved in persecuting Chinese citizens. So eventually karma is going to catch up with them.
Thanks for your question, Unpotatoed Salmon.
And thank you to everyone else as well who supports us directly through Patreon or Locals.
Patreon is a way for you to contribute a dollar or more per episode, and interact with us.
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The links are below. We really do rely mainly on viewer support for this show.
Once again, I’m Chris Chappell. Thanks for watching China Uncensored.