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Human Rights Groups Call Out UN For Failing To Stand Up To China’s Genocide

(Photo by Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)

Brianna Lyman News and Commentary Writer
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A group of 192 human rights organizations wrote an open letter Tuesday calling out the United Nations (UN) for failing to stand up to Beijing and genocide.

The letter was released after U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said her office made a deal with China for her to tour the communist nation, including Xinjiang, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The letter demands Bachelet follow through on her “commitment last year to release a report on grave ongoing human rights violations by Chinese authorities targeting Uyghurs and other Turkic communities in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.”

Bachelet’s office promised in September that it would assess allegations of human rights violations and release the report within weeks, according to the WSJ. The report has yet to be released.

Witness Uyghur teacher Qelbinur Sidik holds up a photograph of the hospital where she says she underwent a forced sterilization procedure on the first day of hearings at the "Uyghur Tribunal", a panel of UK-based lawyers and rights experts investigating alleged abuses against Uyghurs in China, in London on June 4, 2021. - The panel, which has no state backing, will begin hearing evidence from witnesses on Friday, and plans to issue a verdict on whether Beijing has perpetrated genocide or crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim groups in China. Beijing has branded it a "machine producing lies". (Photo by Tolga Akmen / AFP) (Photo by TOLGA AKMEN/AFP via Getty Images)

Witness Uyghur teacher Qelbinur Sidik holds up a photograph of the hospital where she says she underwent a forced sterilization procedure on the first day of hearings at the “Uyghur Tribunal”, a panel of UK-based lawyers and rights experts investigating alleged abuses against Uyghurs in China, in London on June 4, 2021.  (Photo by TOLGA AKMEN/AFP via Getty Images)

“The release of the report without further delay is essential – to send a message to victims and perpetrators alike that no state, no matter how powerful, is above international law or the robust independent scrutiny of your Office,” the letter continued. It added that Uyghurs and other Muslim ethnic groups have faced “mass detention, torture persecution, and other violations of a scale and nature amounting to crimes against humanity.”

The letter said they’ve reached out to Bachelet’s office several times, with the groups saying they “have been concerned by the relative silence of your Office in the face of these grave violations, aside from procedural updates on the status of negotiations to gain meaningful access to Xinjiang.”

“Victims and survivors should not have to wait any longer. They and their families deserve justice and accountability, and need to know that your Office stands with them.” (RELATED: Western Companies Are Happy To Cut Ties With Russia, But Stay Silent On Uyghur Genocide)

The letter demands Bachelet “fulfill” her obligation and “release the report without further delay.”

“Accountability can wait no longer.”

According to one estimate, as many as two million Uyghurs are being held in these concentration camps.

Former President Donald Trump, in one of his final acts as president, declared that China’s policies toward Uyghurs constitute a genocide. The Associated Press reported that China was committing “demographic genocide” through forced abortions and sterilizations.

President Joe Biden recently signed the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, which bans the import of goods from the Xinjiang region and imposes “sanctions on foreign individuals responsible for forced labor in the region.”

China has denied the allegations of genocide, calling it “the lie of the century,” according to the WSJ. China claims their activities in Xinjiang are related to curbing religious extremism and terrorism.