Members of the European Parliament urge EU to take strong action on China for human rights violation
Sep 18, 2020
Brussels [Belgium], September 18 : As human rights violations in China continues to aggravate, the Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) have requested the European Union to meaningfully address China's human rights atrocities through strong action at the EU-China Summit.
Raphael Glucksmann, Reinhard Butikofer, Engin Eroglu and Miriam Lexmann wrote to the President of the European Council Charles Michel, the President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen, the Chancellor of Germany Angela Merkel and to the President of France Emmanuel Macron.
Citing the letter, EU Chronicle reported the MEPs expressing their "deep concern about the widespread, serious and ongoing human rights violations occurring in the People's Republic of China" and called for the "issue to be substantively addressed during the upcoming EU-China Summit on 14 September".
The leaders have been "greatly alarmed by the rapidly deteriorating situation in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in China in particular".
The MEPs said, "Over the past three years, there have been credible allegations of mass arbitrary detention of millions of Uyghurs in internment camps, mass sterilization of Uyghur women and efforts to diminish Uyghur births, widespread destruction of mosques, shrines graveyards and other physical manifestations of Uyghur culture, history and identity, efforts to suppress Uyghur language, forced labour and modern slavery, serious religious persecution, separation of children from families and other human rights violations".
The MEPs also expressed concern over "the serious human rights violations against Tibetans, the impact of the National Security Law in Hong Kong and the deprivation of language rights for ethnic Mongolians in Inner Mongolia, as well as the general crackdown on Chinese democracy, activists and lawyers".
Urging for an urgent and "robust response from the European Union", the leaders said that the efforts being taken have not resulted in any positive change in behaviour from the Chinese government.
EU Chronicle reported that this month's "EU-China Human Rights Dialogue represents an ideal opportunity to match the EU's rhetoric regarding human rights violations in China with concrete action" proposed the MEPs, insisting that in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, this opportunity must be used "to reassess the relations and insist on not conducting business as usual with a government committing atrocities and crimes against humanity".
The parliamentarians have called for "targeted sanctions and assets freezes against Chinese officials responsible for policies violating human rights".
