China’s Policy on its Uyghur Population

Tom Tugendhat Excerpts

Monday 12th October 2020 Westminster Hall

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow such eminent speakers. I agree with so many of the points made that I will skip to others, which have not. We do not seek to hold China to either a standard that we would not hold ourselves to, or indeed one that China has not already agreed to. China has already agreed and signed the international convention on the elimination of all forms of racial discrimination, the convention on the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide, the UN convention against torture and other cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment, the convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women, the UN convention on the rights of the child, the slavery convention 1926 and the international covenant on civil and political rights. Perhaps most importantly, it was China or, rather, a Chinese diplomat who drafted the individual rights into the UN declaration. P.C. Chang, then a representative of the Chinese Government, held the pen and wrote into international law the principles of individual rights that we value so highly today.

These are not western values; they are universal values that China has agreed to, that the Chinese state has accepted and pledged to obey, and which it is now violating among one of the ethnic minority populations within its borders. This is not something to which we can look idly by and pretend is not happening, because this is not just about the torture, murder and forced sterilisation of Uyghur Muslims—it is of course about that. It is also not just about the violation of freedom of faith and the repression of the Islamic community in western China—and, by the way, the repression of the Christian community across China. It is also—fundamentally for this House—about the liberty of the British people, whom we are here to represent. Our ability to represent and to defend the rights and interests of the people of these islands is contingent on the rights and liberties of other people being respected. We cannot trade and travel freely and fairly if the people of those countries are not free to enjoy the liberties that we think matter.

Anyone who does not think that that is true should ask the family of Michael Kovrig, a Canadian diplomat who worked for the International Crisis Group who was arrested and has been detained for two years by the Chinese Government. The Chinese state—this communist state—is violating the rights of not only Chinese citizens, but all citizens, which is why it is right that this House speak out.