European Parliament resolution would seek sanctions on Chinese officials in Xinjiang
- A draft resolution urges EU leaders to use new sanction powers to punish Xinjiang officials
- The motion comes after the EU’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, dodged questions about plans to sanction officials found to have suppressed Uygurs
The European Parliament will urge European Union leaders to use new sanction powers to punish Xinjiang officials but stop short of invoking any claim of “genocide”, according to a draft resolution seen by the South China Morning Post.
The motion’s preparation comes shortly after the EU’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, dodged questions whether he planned to introduce sanctions against those found to have suppressed the Uygur Muslim communities in China’s northwest.
Borrell said last week that none of the EU’s 27 member states had yet tabled any sanction plans on the issue of Uygurs – without mentioning that he was also empowered by the new EU sanctions rules to introduce such punitive measures himself.
Attention to China’s treatment of the Uygurs and other ethnic Muslims in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region has grown over the past three years, with human rights advocates contending their detention in re-education camps and allegations of forced labour make the situation a global calamity.
While campaigning in August, Joe Biden, now the US president-elect, said through a spokesman that “the unspeakable oppression that Uygurs and other ethnic minorities have suffered at the hands of China’s authoritarian government is genocide”.
