The Canadian House of Commons voted 266 to 0 to pass the motion proposed by the opposition Conservative Party. It acknowledges the Chinese Communist government’s genocide of the Uighurs in Xinjiang. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Liberal cabinet will abstain from voting on a Conservative motion.
The motion, tabled in the House of Commons by Conservative foreign affairs critic Michael Chong, calls on Canada‘s parliament to formally declare the Communist government’s policy against the Uighurs in Xinjiang a genocide and urges the Canadian government to join with allies in responding. The motion also calls on the Canadian government to propose to the International Olympic Committee that the 2022 Winter Olympics not be held in Beijing.
The motion would have Parliament officially declare China’s actions against Uighurs and other Turkic Muslims to be genocide, as defined by the 1948 United Nations Genocide Convention. Media reports, academics and UN experts have accused China of holding Uighurs in centralized and “de-radicalization” camps and targeting them with forced labor, sexual violence, population control tactics and blanket surveillance.
At a press conference on the morning of the 22nd, conservative foreign affairs commentator Michael Chong said the evidence of the Chinese Communist Party‘s crimes is overwhelming. He cited survivor testimony, satellite images, videos, documents and reports from the U.S. and international news media. He said:-“Today is a Time of moral clarity.” “We can no longer ignore this. We have to acknowledge that this is a genocide.” Chong said they hope their Liberal colleagues will vote in favor of the motion so MPs can show a united front on basic human rights issues and send a strong message to China. “When it comes to international human rights issues, we’ve become sadly accustomed to hearing ‘it’s complicated’ to justify not doing the obviously right thing,” said Garnett Genuis, a conservative human rights critic. “But what we’re seeing in front of us is not complicated.”
While the report does not outline any specific actions the government should take going forward, it calls on Canada to join the United States and other allies in taking action to recognize the genocide, Chong said, adding that the “genocide” label could set the stage for stronger action. He also said Ottawa should impose sanctions on Chinese officials accused of committing genocide.
Trudeau and his cabinet ministers have been reluctant to use the word “genocide” to describe China’s actions against the Uighurs. Last week, Trudeau said the word “genocide” is an “extremely complex” word.
Photo credit: UyghurMovement.com
BBC and CNN Expose Sexual Assault, Gang Rape, Abuse of Uyghur Women in Xinjiang ‘Re-Education Camps’
Following the BBC’s allegations of mass rape of women in Xinjiang’s re-education camps, CNN interviewed three Xinjiang minority women who have now fled abroad on February 19 to expose the torture and gang rape of Uyghur women in the “re-education camps.
One Xinjiang woman, Tursunay Ziyawudun, told the media that she was taken to a “re-education camp” in March 2018 and began her nine-month-long nightmare. Ziyawudun revealed that at one point she was beaten and then taken to another room by two female police officers who ordered her to lie on a table where “they inserted a taser into my body and twisted it at will and tasered me and I passed out.”
Ten days later, Ziawdun was taken out of her cell by male police officers when she heard a girl screaming in the next room and saw five or six men come into that room. “The next thing I knew, I was being gang-raped, and it was clear to me right away that the police officers in the next room were doing the same thing to the girl.” Ziaudun said, adding that this happened several times during her time in the detention camp.
The BBC sparked a global outcry in early February when it revealed systematic sexual abuse in the Xinjiang concentration camp. Ziaudun also told the BBC that women in the camps were subjected to unexplained medical examinations, given medication, forcibly injected every 15 days with a “vaccine” that caused adverse reactions such as nausea and numbness, and forced to have birth control devices installed in their bodies.
The Associated Press has also reported that forced sterilization of Uighurs is common in Xinjiang.
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