{"id":633,"date":"2021-05-06T14:36:01","date_gmt":"2021-05-06T11:36:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/?p=633"},"modified":"2021-05-06T14:36:02","modified_gmt":"2021-05-06T11:36:02","slug":"brussels-in-september-as-the-capital-of-the-eu","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/brussels-in-september-as-the-capital-of-the-eu\/","title":{"rendered":"BRUSSELS IN SEPTEMBER, AS THE CAPITAL OF THE EU;"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

RFA<\/a>. 5 May 2021<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Below is an article published by RFA<\/a>. Photo:Reuters.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lawmakers in New Zealand on Wednesday unanimously agreed that \u201csevere human rights abuses\u201d are taking place in China\u2019s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) and called on the government to \u201cwork with all relevant instruments of international law to being these abuses to an end.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

The motion, put through the House of Representatives following a debate, follows the U.S. State Department\u2019s designation in January of the situation in the XUAR as genocide\u2014a term that has since been applied by parliaments in Canada, the Netherlands, and the U.K. A recent vote to adopt a similar resolution failed in Australia\u2019s parliament.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the vote represents the strongest move to date condemning rights abuses in the XUAR by New Zealand, whose economy and regional influence is dwarfed by nearby China, it fell short of labeling them part of a policy of genocide by Beijing. Members of the ruling Labour Party sought to have the term removed from the motion, which was initially proposed by the right-wing minority ACT party.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern welcomed the passage of the motion, calling it \u201ca statement that is strong and that is clear.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ahead of Wednesday\u2019s vote, ACT Deputy Leader and Foreign Affairs spokesperson Brooke van Velden told members of the House that evidence of a genocide in the XUAR\u2014where authorities are believed to have held up to 1.8 million Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in a vast network of internment camps since 2017\u2014is \u201cvoluminous, from multiple sources, and credible.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt is also true that the Uyghur people have been engaged in terrorism across China,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis should not be without consequence, but genocide is not a justifiable consequence for anything. It is certainly not justifiable to show \u2018absolutely no mercy\u2019 as [Chinese] President Xi [Jinping] called for in the \u2018People\u2019s War on Terror\u2019 centered on Xinjiang.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Van Velden warned lawmakers that genocide \u201cdoes not require a war.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt does not need to be sudden, it can be slow and deliberate, and that is what is happening here,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She noted that China must be recognized as a perpetrator of genocide under the 1949 United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, citing a state-sponsored \u201cintent to destroy a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Specifically, she pointed to acts carried out by authorities that include killings, causing serious bodily or mental harm, inflicting conditions calculated to bring about the destruction of a group, preventing births, and forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She also stressed that the vote should not suggest that New Zealand was seeking to punish China as a nation or its people, but rather to hold China\u2019s ruling Communist Party government accountable for its actions in the XUAR.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A day earlier, she had expressed concern that the label was removed from Wednesday\u2019s motion, calling it \u201ca sad state of affairs that we need to soften our language to debate the hard issues.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNew Zealand must assert ourselves and our values and not be picked on by one country,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe cannot sit by as a democratic nation as a genocide is happening in one of our largest trading partners. It\u2019s a matter of human rights.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Watered down\u2019 motion<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dolkun Isa, president of the Munich-based World Uyghur Congress (WUC) welcomed the unanimous vote, but said he was troubled by the decision to omit the label of genocide from the motion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is still a positive step in the right direction because all members of the New Zealand Parliament from across all parties have voted unanimously to recognize China\u2019s severe human rights abuses of Uyghurs,\u201d he told RFA\u2019s Uyghur Service.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019re deeply grateful for the strong support of New Zealand. At the same time, we call on other democratic governments to break their silence and recognize China\u2019s Uyghur genocide.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Luke John de Pulford, a human rights campaigner who founded the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China along with political representatives from seven other democracies, told RFA that the originally proposed wording for the motion had mirrored what was passed by the U.K. parliament last month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He said the approved version had been \u201cwatered down,\u201d ostensibly because New Zealand either isn\u2019t in \u201ca comfortable enough place in their bilateral relationship to speak freely about what\u2019s happening in China\u201d or that \u201cthey\u2019re not comfortable with declaring these things as genocide and crimes against humanity without having had some kind of international investigation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt is a step in the right direction, but New Zealand should not prioritize their bilateral relationship with China over speaking up their values,\u201d he said, adding that the government should quickly move to take \u201ccorresponding actions\u201d over the motion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

RFA. 5 May 2021 Below is an article published by RFA. Photo:Reuters. Lawmakers in New Zealand on Wednesday unanimously agreed that \u201csevere human rights abuses\u201d are taking place in China\u2019s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) and called on the government<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=633"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":636,"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633\/revisions\/636"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=633"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=633"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dukva.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=633"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}