The United Nations General Assembly will vote next Tuesday to re-elect members to the Human Rights Council (UNHRC), and China, Saudi Arabia, and Russia, all of whom have dismal human rights records, are expected to be elected. If that happens, China will become a member of the UN Human Rights Council for the fifth time. Several human rights groups have argued that UN member states should not reward countries that persecute human rights, and that China’s return to the Human Rights Council would be an ironic and destructive blow to the defense of human rights values.
Zhang Zhan, Ling Haobo, Chen Zhaozhi, Liu Yanli, Zhang Jialong …… These Chinese citizens have two things in common: they are all currently detained, sentenced, or missing by the Chinese government on charges of “seeking to provoke trouble. And the complete list is long.
The U.S.-based non-governmental organization Chinese Human Rights Defenders (CHRD) has been documenting the courage of those who have gone on to defend human rights in China, and the accelerating pace of human rights suppression and persecution in China has necessitated the continued updating of this website.
In a country like China, which is likely to be elected to the United Nations Human Rights Council for the fifth time on October 13, Human Rights Defenders Director Xia Renlei sounded frustrated when interviewed by this reporter.
Human rights groups call on UN not to commend China
“It’s ironic that a government like China, which commits such serious human rights abuses, is likely to be re-elected to the Human Rights Council,” Xia Renlei said.
The Human Rights Council, an intergovernmental body of 47 U.N. member states that meets three times a year in Geneva, has 13 members from Asia, which this year is running for four seats and five countries, with China facing competition from Saudi Arabia, Nepal, Pakistan and Uzbekistan.
In addition to human rights defenders, the New York-based NGO Human Rights Watch (HRW) has also called against China’s re-election to the Human Rights Council. Sophie Richardson, China director of Human Rights Watch, told the station that the U.N. human rights machinery exists to promote and improve human rights, and that China’s re-election runs counter to the goals of the Council’s work.
Richardson said, “Looking at China’s record, its actions to persecute human rights are not just within China, but have reached out overseas, including the UN Human Rights Council, where China has tried to undermine the efforts of human rights bodies.”
When human rights groups questioned China’s persecution of Uighurs in Xinjiang during the UN Human Rights Council session, Chinese representatives used the rules of the meeting to continuously block and even bang on tables in protest. China has not only silenced dissenters at home, but has also been visible internationally over the years.
It has been a long-standing problem that countries in dire human rights situations have become key players in the UN human rights machinery, and more and more countries are following China’s example in the UN system.
The UN Human Rights Council, for example, was established in 2006 to replace its predecessor, the UN Commission on Human Rights (UNCHR), which had been criticized for its membership of countries with poor human rights records.
In 2018, the UN Human Rights Council was re-elected and countries with poor human rights records, such as the Philippines and Eritrea, were elected, sparking an outcry from human rights groups.
The Philippines has been condemned by the international community for arbitrarily killing 4,800 suspects in anti-drug operations, while Eritrea has adopted forced conscription as a result of its war.
The United States, on the other hand, unsuccessfully called for UN reform and withdrew from the UN Human Rights Council in June of the same year. In her parting remarks, then-U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley alluded to the “hypocrisy” of having a country like China on the Council and said that the U.S. decision to withdraw was the right one.
In Richardson’s view, the U.S. decision is instead a favor to China. But she believes that the neo-congressional pneumonia epidemic is changing the international tide.
Thirty-nine Nations Speak to UN Concerned About China’s Human Rights Violations
Thirty-nine countries, including the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and Japan, issued a joint statement at the United Nations General Assembly, expressing serious concern over the human rights issue in Xinjiang and the situation in Hong Kong.
Christoph Heusgen, Germany’s Permanent Representative to the UN, called on China to respect human rights, especially the rights of religious and ethnic minorities in Xinjiang and Tibet, in his statement to the UN General Assembly.
In 2019, only twenty-three countries have condemned China on the issue of Uighur.
Richardson said that from human rights groups to sovereign states, there is a growing awareness of China’s persecution of human rights and the use of international organizations to try to change the international community’s concern for human rights in China, and this situation, even if it is still difficult to prevent China from regaining membership in the Human Rights Council, but more and more countries are willing to criticize China, which is positive for the promotion of human rights.
Xia Renlei said that China is becoming more proactive in defending its human rights standards under human rights mechanisms such as the United Nations, and that the world will sink if human rights groups do not speak up to alert more countries.
China’s Human Rights Standards: Is Enough to Eat?
She noted, “The danger is that it (China) is not only continuing to suppress human rights domestically, but it’s also taking its view of human rights and replacing it with an international view of human rights, and dismantling the role that international human rights mechanisms have in monitoring and criticizing countries and governments for human rights violations.
On the eve of the election, human rights defenders released their assessment of China as an NGO under the existing periodic review mechanism of the UN Human Rights Council. Xia Renlei said China made 58 promises to the Human Rights Council to improve human rights, and in their view, almost none of them have been fulfilled.
What kind of human rights standards does China want to export to the world? In 2009, then-Vice President Xi Jinping’s classic quote may reflect his view of human rights.
“Foreigners who have nothing better to do but eat are telling us what to do. China is not exporting revolution, not exporting hunger and poverty, and not tormenting you.
The Chinese people, who wanted to say more for the promotion of human rights, have been shackled one after another. Can the UN Human Rights Council, which is supposed to urge the governments of countries that violate human rights to improve their human rights situation, not be tossed by China again?
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