Opinion | China in a Kangaroo Court
By Philip Yeung, a university teacher
PKY480@gmail.com
Suddenly, everywhere in the West, China is seen as a supervillain.
China stands accused of crimes against humanity. The West has already pronounced it guilty.
The latest to join the condemnation is the UK-based Uyghur Tribunal, supposedly unofficial and allegedly unbiased. But it has behaved no better than a kangaroo court, losing no time in jumping to its foregone conclusion: China is guilty as charged.
How sloppy and unworthy of its name! The Tribunal claims it has applied universal standards on the basis of "proof beyond a reasonable doubt" in rendering its judgment, when all it does is to shock the world with horrid details such as alleged penetration by iron rods.
Where are your evidence and its sources? Relying solely on the testimony of "victims" leaves it open to the possibility that certain witnesses might be paid and planted accusers, a common practice in the espionage business.
What due diligence has it done in checking the background and the bank accounts of these "victims"?
It you apply "reasonable doubt" even loosely, these claims have no leg to stand on.
First, the number of Uyghurs detained ranges from several hundred thousand to as many as two million. These wild swings in its estimates tell me they are imaginary numbers. Are they based on government statistics, satellite images, or simply the overactive imagination of malicious accusers? Where is the verifiable proof that such a harsh judgment demands?
Never has such a major international judgment been rendered on such wild discrepancies and flimsy evidence.
If you want to nail China, give us solid, verifiable numbers. If you can't meet this low threshold, you have allegations but no case.
As for "victim" accounts, let me paraphrase a proverb: a few swallows do not a summer make. A scattering of "purported victims" is a far cry from documenting systematic abuses.
Tellingly, the Tribunal admitted there was no evidence of mass killings and that those detained were "largely freed after re-indoctrination", which comports with Chinese insistence that terrorists were taken in for re-education and occupational reintegration-- a far better treatment than meted out to tortured detainees locked up indefinitely in Guantanamo Bay. Where is your tribunal for the horrors of America's terrorist detention center?
I am suspicious when the woman who campaigned for boycott of the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics for its "Uyghur genocide" was not even from Xinjiang, but from Tibet.
I find accusations of systematic gang rape and forced sterilizations of Uyghur women laughable. If there is any word that describes the Chinese system, it is "discipline". With the world's eyes on Xinjiang, China will never tolerate such a breakdown in discipline. Its officials risk instant dismissal for any racial insensitivity. They are known for their iron discipline.
The Tribunal claims that ethnic birthrates in Uyghur regions have dropped by up to 66%. But, again, where is the proof? Where do these numbers come from? Could there have been distorted by relocations? These extravagant but unproven numbers are calculated to shock. What a strange and sensational tribunal!
If the Tribunal cannot produce the sources to support its verdict, it should bite its tongue and withhold its findings.
If you accuse China of "forced sterilizations" of Muslim women, then you must first explain why Muslims have never been subjected to China's previous one-child policy, allowing them to "go forth and multiply". They enjoy a whole slew of "affirmative action" measures, including lower requirements for university entrance, and freedom to do street hawking in third tier cities.
China is riding high on its momentum of success. Why would it stoop to such unspeakable depravity? Its officials are rewarded for achievements, not for punishments. From the gravity-defying bridges, to the world's longest sea-skimming highway, it is a nation drunk on success and purpose.
Eerily, no Muslim country has accused China of mistreating Islamists. The howls of manufactured outrage have come exclusively from America and its allies. I wonder why?
For one more reasonable doubt, turn to Hong Kong.
It is the world's most open city, where western journalist are free to roam and report on the riots. And yet, with their eyes wide open, they lie and distort, glorifying 12 or 13-year-olds manning the barricades and shouting slogans robotically, ignoring gangs terrorizing mainlanders, university presidents cowering in fear, expensive university labs being smashed, and a man being burnt alive for holding a different position, with its legislative assembly perpetually paralyzed. They condemn the US Capitol riots but not the Hong Kong street violence. So much for western journalistic objectivity.
If they can lie with open access, they can lie even more freely with the Xinjiang borders closed. All they need is to conjure up images of evil they please.
Truth is dead on the anti-China altar. Accusations against China, however outrageous, require no validation.
I learned from decades of living in the West that we face a monster in its democratic system. That beast is called "climate of opinion". Once it has taken root, woe betide anyone who dares to challenge it.
Sino-phobia is now bone-deep in this "climate of opinion.
If this system doesn't die of hypocrisy, it surely will die of its own self-contradictions.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of DotDotNews.
Read more articles by Philip Yeung:
Opinion | The world owes China an apology
Comment