By Ben Kerrigan-
The UK has declared sanctions against China due to ‘gross human rights violations’ against Uighur Muslims.
The US announced sanctions on Monday against two Chinese officials for “serious human rights abuses” against Uyghur Muslims, a step coordinated with the European Union, Canada and the United Kingdom, after similar sanctions on the same individuals and others.
The sanctions will include travel bans and seizure of assets against particular individuals
“Chinese authorities will continue to face consequences as long as atrocities occur in Xinjiang,” said the Treasury Department’s Director of the Office of Foreign Assets Control Andrea M. Gacki. “Treasury is committed to promoting accountability for the Chinese government’s human rights abuses, including arbitrary detention and torture, against Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities.
The country has been discriminating against Uighurs for years, with more than a million held in mass detention facilities in Xinjiang province since 2017, as per Amnesty International, in an effort to ‘wipe out religious beliefs and aspects of cultural identity to enforce political loyalty’.
Amid the abuse of human rights, Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab has now announced the first UK sanctions against Chinese government officials
Human Rights Violations
The sanctions are targeted at the perpetrators of human rights violations taking place against Uighurs and other minorities in Xinjiang, according to the government website.
Raab described China’s treatment of Uighurs was “one of the worst human rights crises of our time” and “the largest mass detention of an ethnic or religious group since the second World War”.
Raab said, ‘The evidence of widespread human rights abuses in Xinjiang cannot be ignored – including mass detention and surveillance, reports of torture and forced sterilisation. Working with our international partners we are imposing targeted sanctions to hold those responsible to account.’
The sanctions will be immediately imposed against the Public Security Bureau of the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, which is responsible for security and policing in the area.
Foreign Cleansing
A wide body of evidence has been collected by human rights groups and foreign governments have accused China of a campaign of ethnic cleansing against Uighur Muslims, which the US has labelled as genocide.
The evidence includes the mass internment of 1m Uighurs, forced sterilisation of women, religious persecution and the forceable removal of children from their parents.
“People are detained for having too may children, for praying too much, for having a beard or a head scarf – for having wrong thoughts,” Raab said.
They will also affect four senior officials attached to Xinjiang and its horrific practices against Uighurs: Zhu Hailun, former secretary of the political and legal affairs committee; Wang Junzheng, deputy secretary of the party committee; Wang Mingshan, secretary of the political and legal affairs committee; and Chen Mingguo, vice chairman of the Xinjiang government.
The sanctions will see asset freezes and travel bans issued against those mentioned, authorised under the UK’s Global Human Rights sanctions regime for systemic violations against Uighurs and other minorities.
The government press release explains, ‘The measures come as part of intensive diplomacy by the UK, United States, Canada and European Union to deliver complementary action on Xinjiang. It follows the trend of a growing number of countries holding China to account for its human rights record, with 39 countries signing a joint statement at the UN.’