The Limited Times

Now you can see non-English news...

Michelle Bachelet reveals China's pressure on the UN to hide the repression of the Uyghur minority

2022-08-25T13:26:34.892Z


The High Commissioner for Human Rights assures before leaving her post that Beijing sent her a letter to prevent the publication of a report on the abuses


Beijing pressured the United Nations to leave in a drawer a report that has not yet been published on the human rights situation in the northern Chinese region of Xinjiang, home to 12 million members of the Uyghur Muslim minority, Michelle revealed Thursday. Bachelet, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, at her last press conference in Geneva (Switzerland) before leaving office on August 31, officially by her own decision.

Taking stock of her four-year term, Bachelet revealed that the Chinese authorities sent her a letter, signed by 40 other countries whose names she did not specify, in which they urged the organization not to publish that document.

Her office "did not respond" to what she defined as "pressure", the high commissioner stressed.

The report on China's treatment of the Uyghurs has been in the works for three years, but it is expected to also include the results of a controversial visit that Bachelet made to the Asian country between May 23 and 28, the first by a person in charge of human rights of the UN since 2005. That trip earned him bitter criticism from human rights organizations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch and even from the US State Department, which made him ugly for his supposed "lukewarmness" towards China and the moderate tone of his criticism of the country's authorities, which they compared to an image washing of the Chinese regime.

The disclosure of this text, which, according to Bachelet, Beijing has tried to prevent with the support of its allies, has been postponed for months for unknown reasons.

The also former president of Chile (2006-2010 and 2014-2018), 70, justified this delay precisely on the grounds that time is needed to add the results of her visit to China in May.

"We are trying to fulfill what I promised," she said, alluding to her commitment to publish the document before the end of her term, on August 31, but without fully confirming that this promise will come true.

“We are working on the report.

I had every intention of publishing it before the end of my term and we have received substantial comments from the Chinese government that we will have to carefully examine, as we always do with any country (...) I have been under enormous pressure to publish or not to publish [the document] but it will not be those pressures that will make us publish it or not, ”said the high commissioner.

Several Western countries, led by the United States, have urged the UN in recent months to release the report.

Although the massive scope of Beijing's repression against the Uyghurs had already been denounced, on May 25, while Bachelet was still in Chinese territory, a journalistic investigation by 14 international media, including EL PAÍS, revealed tens of thousands of police records, photographs and official documents that confirmed the systematic nature of the persecution of that ethnic group, with very serious human rights abuses that could have suffered more than two million people.

The investigation revealed the generalization of abuses such as internment, including of minors, in re-education and indoctrination centers, ill-treatment for the most banal reasons, institutionalized forced labor and even an official policy of "shooting to kill" if inmates they try to escape.

More information

China places more than two million people under the radar of the repression in Xinjiang

When only two weeks had passed since her return from China, on June 13, Bachelet announced that she would not stand for re-election in her position and alleged "personal reasons", although, according to various sources, it was precisely that controversial visit that motivated your decision.

Days before, Antony Blinken, the Secretary of State of the United States—one of the five permanent members and with the right to veto the UN Security Council—criticized that the High Commissioner did not demand access in China to people forcibly transferred by Beijing to enclaved regions of the country and that Bachelet had not done enough research on the disappeared Uyghurs.

The executive director of the NGO Human Rights Watch, Kenneth Roth, had previously described the management of the former Chilean president regarding China as "disastrous",

and underlined that someone more critical of abuse should replace her in office.

Until now, Bachelet's name appeared in the pools to succeed António Guterres as Secretary General of the UN.

Succession

In the shadow of these criticisms that have marked the end of her mandate, Bachelet delivered a low-profile final speech during the press conference, broadcast by videoconference, in which the revelation about the pressures from China and other countries did not come until journalists' question time.

During his speech, he paid tribute to "human rights defenders", recalled some of the wars still open in the world, such as the one in Ukraine, and asked Russia to stop its "armed action" in that country.

The high commissioner in turn alluded to the "deep impact of covid-19", the food and energy crisis and the effects of climate change on the planet.

"The journey to defend human rights never ends and monitoring setbacks in terms of those rights is vital," Bachelet reiterated.

Regarding his possible successor, the high commissioner assured, without offering any names, that "there are about 50 candidates."

During my 4 years as High Commissioner, I had the privilege of speaking to so many courageous, spirited, extraordinary #HumanRights defenders 🇩 – UN Human Rights Chief @mbachelet pays tribute to them in last press conference before ending her mandate.

pic.twitter.com/m1jVmeR2hP

— UN Human Rights (@UNHumanRights) August 25, 2022

Bachelet also broke down several of her final purposes for the days she has left as head of the UN Human Rights Office.

One of them, calling the president of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, to remind him of “promises that should not be forgotten”, in reference to the human rights situation in that country.

The socialist Bachelet stressed as an achievement of her performance as high commissioner having established "cooperation" with the Venezuelan authorities in a country with which "there was nothing before."

Bachelet left her plans up in the air when she left office and returned to her native Chile.

He only offered two details.

The first, that he will “vote [yes] the new Constitution” of his country promoted by the new Chilean president, Gabriel Boric, who will submit to a referendum on September 4.

The second, that "she will not dedicate herself to knitting".

Follow all the international information on

Facebook

and

Twitter

, or in

our weekly newsletter

.

Source: elparis

All news articles on 2022-08-25

You may like

News/Politics 2024-02-06T20:22:11.361Z

Trends 24h

News/Politics 2024-03-27T16:45:54.081Z
News/Politics 2024-03-28T06:04:53.137Z

Latest

© Communities 2019 - Privacy

The information on this site is from external sources that are not under our control.
The inclusion of any links does not necessarily imply a recommendation or endorse the views expressed within them.