Human Rights, Freedom and Solidarity
Nouse. 15 April 2021
Below is an article published by Nouse. Photo:Leif Harboe.
In an age of fast fashion and even faster news, staying ‘woke’ presents itself as an exhausting task. A topic that isn’t just another uninformed marketing faux pas, the issue of forced labour in Xinjiang involves one million people and demands everyone’s attention.
Read more
Middle East Monitor. 12 April 2021
Below is an article published by The Middle East Monitor. Photo:ZAN KOSE/AFP via Getty Images.
It is a fact that rape and sexual abuse have been used as weapons of war throughout history. The lack of security leaves women and girls, in particular, more vulnerable than usual to violence. For a long time, this was just accepted as inevitable in conflicts, and few efforts were made to prosecute perpetrators of mass rapes and sexual violence. We saw this in Bosnia in the 1990s where, for example, the UNHCR reported that 50,000 women were raped by Bosnian Serbs as a war tactic.
Read more
Financial Times. 12 April 2021
Below is an article published by Financial Times. Photo:Sedat Suna/EPA/Shutterstock.
Ankara has summoned China’s ambassador over a tweet that targeted Turkish politicians critical of the treatment of the country’s Uyghur minority, in a rare show of displeasure with Beijing. The Chinese embassy said it had “a right to respond” after Meral Aksener, chair of the centre-right Good party, and Mansur Yavas, mayor of Ankara, wrote tweets commemorating a 1990 Uyghur uprising in the Chinese region of Xinjiang. A tweet from the embassy’s official account, tagging the Turkish politicians, said it “opposes and violently condemns any sort of challenge to Chinese sovereignty and territorial integrity by any person or power”.
Read more
Human Rights Watch. 8 April 2021
Below is an article published by Human Rights Watch. Photo:AP.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is hoping the Chinese government will grant UN experts unrestricted access to detention centers in Xinjiang where over a million Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims have faced torture and myriad other human rights abuses. But he should make clear to Beijing that an investigation can take place with or without access.
Read more
The Guardian. 23 April 2021
Below is an article published by The Guardian. Photo:Guy Bell/Rex/Shutterstock.
British MPs voted to declare that China is committing genocide against the Uyghur people in Xinjiang province.
The motion passed on Thursday does not compel the government to act but is likely to mark a further decline in relations with China. In response, Beijing’s embassy in the UK accused the MPs of having “cooked up” the motion “with a view to discrediting and attacking China”.
Read moreBelow is an article published by RFA. Photo:AFP.
Restrictions on fasting during the holy Islamic month of Ramadan have eased in China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) in recent years, but residents continue to refrain from doing so, according to local authorities, suggesting a lingering fear of being branded an “extremist” and marked for detention.
Read more