Diplomats from 12 countries with large Muslim populations and some foreign media have visited Xinjiang, following months of silence by governments across the Muslim world in the face of China’s crackdown on minority Muslim Uighurs in its far western region.
Envoys from Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, India, Pakistan, Indonesia, Malaysia, Afghanistan, Thailand and Kuwait visited the region from Dec. 28 to Sunday last week, China’s state-run Xinhua news agency said on Monday.
Reuters reported that it was among a small group of foreign media outlets that went on a separate trip organized by the government.
The visit came as increasing skepticism over Beijing’s human rights record — namely its campaign against the Uighurs — threatens its global ambitions.
Calls have grown in the West to pressure Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) government to stop alleged human rights abuses against Uighurs.
US politicians have proposed freezing the travel and assets of top Chinese officials, including the Chinese Communist Party’s Xinjiang chief Chen Quanguo (陳全國).
However, China has so far escaped serious criticism from officials in the Muslim world, leading US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to blast Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei for not speaking out.
“The dire human rights situation inside China and the continued downward trajectory, by virtually every measure,” have continued since Xi came to power, a US congressional report said in October last year.
The UN has requested direct access to the camps, CNN reported, citing UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet.
Xinhua’s report came days after China passed a five-year work plan to Sinicize Islam at a summit with Chinese Muslim associations.
“They agreed to guide Islam to be compatible with socialism and implement measures to Sinicize the religion,” the state-run Global Times said.
In Xinjiang’s Hetian District last month, the diplomats visited one of what the Chinese government calls vocational skills centers — but which the UN and rights groups have said are “re-education camps” interning as many as 1 million Muslims.
At the Moyu County Vocational Skills Education and Training Center, “students are studying the national language, national musical instruments, calligraphy and painting, legal knowledge and various employment skills in the classroom,” Xinhua said. “The envoys asked the students about their study and life in detail, and watched the performances of the students.”
“Xinjiang is an open place,” Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Lu Kang (陸慷) told a media briefing in Beijing on Monday.
However, he cautioned those who would visit to “abide by the purposes and principles of the UN Charter and refrain from interfering in others’ internal affairs or undermining others’ sovereignty.”
“They should adopt an objective and unbiased attitude and avoid buying one-sided stories or making preconceptions. We would like to remain in contact with the relevant UN agencies and meet each other halfway,” he said.
Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying (華春瑩) also hit back against 15 ambassadors to China who expressed concerns over Xinjiang in a letter in November last year, calling their actions “rude and unacceptable.”
‘UNUSUAL EVENT’: The Australian defense minister said that the Chinese navy task group was entitled to be where it was, but Australia would be watching it closely The Australian and New Zealand militaries were monitoring three Chinese warships moving unusually far south along Australia’s east coast on an unknown mission, officials said yesterday. The Australian government a week ago said that the warships had traveled through Southeast Asia and the Coral Sea, and were approaching northeast Australia. Australian Minister for Defence Richard Marles yesterday said that the Chinese ships — the Hengyang naval frigate, the Zunyi cruiser and the Weishanhu replenishment vessel — were “off the east coast of Australia.” Defense officials did not respond to a request for comment on a Financial Times report that the task group from
Asian perspectives of the US have shifted from a country once perceived as a force of “moral legitimacy” to something akin to “a landlord seeking rent,” Singaporean Minister for Defence Ng Eng Hen (黃永宏) said on the sidelines of an international security meeting. Ng said in a round-table discussion at the Munich Security Conference in Germany that assumptions undertaken in the years after the end of World War II have fundamentally changed. One example is that from the time of former US president John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address more than 60 years ago, the image of the US was of a country
BLIND COST CUTTING: A DOGE push to lay off 2,000 energy department workers resulted in hundreds of staff at a nuclear security agency being fired — then ‘unfired’ US President Donald Trump’s administration has halted the firings of hundreds of federal employees who were tasked with working on the nation’s nuclear weapons programs, in an about-face that has left workers confused and experts cautioning that the Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE’s) blind cost cutting would put communities at risk. Three US officials who spoke to The Associated Press said up to 350 employees at the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) were abruptly laid off late on Thursday, with some losing access to e-mail before they’d learned they were fired, only to try to enter their offices on Friday morning
CONFIDENT ON DEAL: ‘Ukraine wants a seat at the table, but wouldn’t the people of Ukraine have a say? It’s been a long time since an election, the US president said US President Donald Trump on Tuesday criticized Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and added that he was more confident of a deal to end the war after US-Russia talks. Trump increased pressure on Zelenskiy to hold elections and chided him for complaining about being frozen out of talks in Saudi Arabia. The US president also suggested that he could meet Russian President Vladimir Putin before the end of the month as Washington overhauls its stance toward Russia. “I’m very disappointed, I hear that they’re upset about not having a seat,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida when asked about the Ukrainian
RSS