The so-called Uyghur Tribunal, which accuses China of committing ‘genocide’ against the nation’s Islamic minority, convened from June 4 to 7 in London. This so-called tribunal is actually a private company registered in the UK that is supported by business persons and private foundations, its major source of funding coming from anti-China separatist organizations.
In our previous article, we highlighted expert opinions arguing that the court has no legal basis. In this article, we look more closely at the so-called tribunal committee.
The chair and the delegation of the so-called Uyghur Tribunal offers some important clues about the ideological position and the “stance” of this organization. In addition to being an ‘archnemesis’ of the Communist Party of China, the delegation of this so-called tribunal also carries out various ideological activities against some Asian countries such as Russia, Turkey, Iran, and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK).
The Vice president of the CIA-funded World Uyghur Congress (WUC), Erkin Ekrem explained his plans for China at the “East Turkistan Awareness Meeting” organized by the Gelecek Party with its leader Ahmet Davutoglu (the former Prime Minister) in Turkey on October 2020:
“We have a three-phase plan. Phase one would be to confirm by the Congresses of the United States, Britain, and France that East Turkestan is an occupation zone and a colony of China. A special tribunal was set up in London as well. It is chaired by a person named Geoffrey Nice. This person had prosecuted Milosevic previously. If the tribunal finds that China indeed committed a genocide, we will apply for the international law. We have the support of the European Jewish and Christian communities and the support of the Holy See. We expect that the recent interests of the UK and France, will create a domino effect. The second phase is the protection of East Turkistan by the UN peacekeeper forces. If that happens, then our third phase, the independence process will begin. We are going to establish a National Assembly. We are currently in phase two now. Uyghurs in Turkey should also enter into political parties and continue their righteous cause of East Turkistan.”(1)
When we look at the members of the delegation of the so-called Uyghur Tribunal, it appears that they have a profile in line with the centers that support the three-phase plan above.
Their activities and affiliations help to understand the so-called tribunal’s ideological view and display this organization’s favored side, though it claims to be impartial.
Panel members:
1. Chair of the ‘tribunal’ Geoffrey Nice organised a similiar ‘tribunal in London claiming ‘genocide’ against China with the application of Dolkun Isa. Nice’s past actions are:
* Leading the tribunal of the former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic over the accusations in the Bosnian War.
* Declaring the Syrian Government and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad war criminals. In 2014, he led the team that published the ‘Caesar Report’, which claimed the Syrian government had committed “crimes against humanity” and “war crimes”. Based on these allegations, the US administration has implemented the ‘Caesar Act’, which includes the heaviest sanctions against Syria to this date. (2)
* Accusing the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea for human rights violations (3)
* Accusing the Iranian government of human rights abuses — Nice is also a co-founder of the Iran Tribunal. The Iran Tribunal targets the Islamic Republic of Iran and accuses it of heavy violations of human rights. (4)
* Having close ties to anti-China separatist groups and centers, Nice is also a strong supporter of the Hong Kong separatists. (5)
*Nice is also the president of the China Tribunal, which is affiliated with the US-based Falun Gong religious cult. Nice claimed in the so-called tribunal that China had “harvested the organs” of the prosecuted member of Falun Gong. (6) Li Hongzhi, who is the leader of the CIA-backed Falun Gong cult, which operates in China under the name of interfaith dialogue just like the Gulenist Terrorist Organization, which is a CIA-backed organization in Turkey and were prosecuted later on, lives in the United States, just like Fetullah Gulen.
*Geoffrey Nice is part of the ‘Knowing Our Rights’ project funded by the Open Society Foundation, founded by American investor George Soros, who is known to fund terrorist activities, coup plots, and domestic provocations in various countries around the world. The project is organized under the umbrella of the think-tank ‘Britain in Europe’. (7)
2. Nick Vetch, Vice Chair of the so-called tribunal, is multimillionaire founder of the biggest self storage company Big Yellow Group in the UK. According to the report of the “Global Self-Storage and Moving Services Industry”, self-storage and moving services market to reach $126.5 Billion by 2027. Amid the COVID-19 crisis, the global market for Self-Storage and Moving Services estimated at $80.8 Billion in the year 2020, and it is projected to reach a revised size of $126.5 Billion by 2027, growing at a CAGR of 6.6% over the analysis period 2020-2027. The US Market is Estimated at $23.9 Billion, while China is forecast to grow at 6.2% CAGR. China, the world’s second largest economy, is forecast to reach a projected market size of $22.1 Billion by the year 2027 trailing a CAGR of 6.2% over the analysis period 2020 to 2027. According to the report, “in the global Non-Climate Controlled Self-Storage segment, USA, Canada, Japan, China and Europe will drive the 5.7% CAGR estimated for this segment. These regional markets accounting for a combined market size of $11 Billion in the year 2020 will reach a projected size of $16.3 Billion by the close of the analysis period. China will remain among the fastest growing in this cluster of regional markets. Led by countries such as Australia, India, and South Korea, the market in Asia-Pacific is forecast to reach $14.5 Billion by the year 2027.” (8)
Therefore, we can understand why a multi-millionaire businessman in the self-storage business took part in the so-called court administration that accused China of ‘genocide’. This is an unethical attitude and an important indication that the court is not impartial.
3. Dame Parveen Kumar, British doctor who is currently Professor of Medicine and Education at Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry. In 2000 she was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire and in 2017, she was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE). She is of Indian origin, but according to her claims, her family was forced to flee to China, then they were forced to return to India. They moved to England when she was 13. Since then, she has been a loyal servant of the UK: her anti-China position is historical.
4. Audrey Osler is Professor of Education at the University of South-Eastern Norway and Professor Emerita of Human Rights Education and Citizenship at the University of Leeds. She was also a visiting scholar at the Institute of Education Hong Kong. In 2012 she presented her lecture “Children’s Human Rights and Citizenship Education: Re-thinking Narratives in Schooling.” at the International and Comparative Education Research Institute, Beijing Normal University. (9)
Counsel:
1. Hamid Sabi – Counsel to the Tribunal: Sabi is an Iranian attorney who has left his country and moved to England after the Iranian Revolution. Sabi has represented Americans in more than 40 court cases between Iran and the US. He was also leading the so-called Iran Tribunal that accused Iran of human rights violations. He describes himself in his own book as follows: “Hamid Sabi has been active in human rights issues involving Iran and has cooperated with human rights organizations and activists.”(10)
He is also an anti-China activist who defends Falun Gong members for the so-called China Tribunal and called for the top United Nations human rights body to investigate “evidence that China is murdering members of the Falun Gong spiritual group and harvesting their organs for transplant”. (11)
2. Aarif Abraham – Legal Adviser to the Tribunal: Abraham is an international human rights attorney who organized a webinar about Turkey’s neglect of human rights after the July 15 coup attempt. Abraham wrote an article in his blog and indicated that European human rights courts are facing dictatorship, nationalism and intolerance by its member countries. He presents Turkey and Russia as examples and states that they have lost their progress on the improvement of the rule of law. Abraham states that Turkey has regressed from the reforms made in the early 2000s and that Russia has returned to its traditional values against western liberal norms. (12)
The Bar Human Rights Committee of England and Wales (BHRC) published a document in 2020 titled “high-level Briefing Paper on the responsibility of governments under international law in relation to the widely reported severe ill-treatment, repression and abuse of Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims by China”. It was co-authored by Aarif Abraham.(13) He directly targeted the Chinese state and called for an international mechanisms (whether state or non-state) to carry out investigations to “determine comprehensively any violation by China”. (14)
Advisors:
Coalition for Genocide Response, founded by Luke de Pulford and Ewelina Ochab.
Luke de Pulford, is a “human rights campaigner, particularly in human rights abuses in China”. He sits as a Commissioner on the Conservative Party Human Rights Commission and advises the World Uyghur Congress. He is a co-founder of the campaign group ‘Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China’. This group runs a campaign for the revocation of extradition treaties with Hong Kong and imposing economic sanctions against China. He strongly supports Hong Kong separatists. He defines the Communist Party of China as “the world’s biggest human rights abuser and a human rights threat not just within their own boundaries, but also to the rest of the world”. (15)
Ewelina Ochab is a ‘human rights’ advocate and author. She has called the United Nations to step up and ensure independent investigations against China: “This could be done by establishing a U.N. Human Rights Council mechanism, such as a commission of inquiry or a fact finding mission or a U.N. General Assembly mechanism, akin to the IIIM for Syria, to investigate, collect and preserve evidence of atrocities.” (16)
The abovementioned people also provide policy proposals to British governments and the US.
Leading Separatists Groups:
The groups, including the World Uyghur Congress (WUC), the Uyghur American Association (UAA), and Campaign for Uyghurs, which claims to be the leading voice for Uyghur interests and human rights around the world, are organizing the tribunal campaign.
They are the groups that the US government-backed lobbying has set up to lead the exiled Uyghur separatist movement. These groups, which provide millions of dollars in funding from the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), sponsored by the US government, are working closely with Washington and other Western governments to escalate hostilities with China. The National Endowment for Democracy (NED) has been central to the rising international prominence of these Uyghur separatist movements. In 2020, the NED boasted that it has given Uyghur groups $8,758,300 since 2004 (including $75,000 in annual funding to the UAA) and claimed to be “the only institutional funder for Uyghur advocacy and human rights organizations.”
• Rushan Abbas, head of he WUC affiliate organization, Campaign for Uyghurs
Rushan Abbas is the so-called President of the “Campaign for Uyghurs” (CFU) affiliated with the World Uyghur Congress (DUK) which is funded by the National Endowment For Democracy (NED), which is widely known to be a “veiled CIA” organization that is funded in Washington. Abbas is one of the influential figures of the DUK both under the Presidency of Rabia Kadir and under the current President Dolkun Isa. Bio of her “extensive experience working with US government agencies, including Homeland Security, Department of Defense, Department of State, and various US intelligence agencies.” She served the US government and Bush administration’s so-called war on terror as a “consultant at Guantanamo Bay supporting Operation Enduring Freedom.” Abbas is introduced on the NED’s website as follows: “Rushan Abbas, founder of the CFU, frequently informs decision-makers about human rights in the Uyghur region. He also testified on the US House of Representatives Foreign Relations Committee and on the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Senator Marco Rubio brought Abbas to the nationwide address as the first Uyghur guest in February 2020.”
• Omer Kanat serves as the WUC’s Chairman of the Executive Committee:
Kanat helped founding the WUC and has been a permanent fixture in its executive leadership. The veteran operative has a lengthy history of work with the US government, from serving as senior editor of Radio Free Asia’s Uyghur Service from 1999 to 2009 to covering the US wars on Iraq and Afghanistan and interviewing the Dalai Lama for the network.
• Dolkun Isa, the current President of the World Uyghur Congress:
Dolkun Isa was one of the three people who received the CIA-backed NED’s 2019 Democracy Award. He is known to have organized various terrorist attacks in the Xinjiang region. Including the 2009 terrorist attack in Urumqi when 197 people died and 1700 people were injured.
He is also an ‘important witness’ on the list. He claims in his testimony that his mother was taken to a concentration camp and murdered. But the Chinese government states that his mother died from leukemia in the hospital.
Conclusion: the target is Asia
The aim is make it so more legislative bodies around the world to recognize the ‘Uyghur Genocide’ in this process. Lobbyists of Uyghur separatism and head of this so-called tribunal in Europe are expected to intensify their efforts towards this direction.
When we look at this delegation, we can clearly see that this is not a legal court, but a political organization, serving various interest /capital groups.
The ‘Uyghur campaign’ launched by the US centers and those who run it are enough for us to see the organization’s target and understand its illegitimacy. These names do not target only China but also all Asian values through China.
They accuse Turkey, Iran and Russia of committing human rights violations. They defend the Western-based theses that declare Asian civilizations ‘backward’ and ‘despotic’. They are taking a stand against the rise of Asia by targeting China, the rising power of not only Asia but the world. They are actively targeting the multipolar worldview.
Asian countries should see the political and ideological basis of this court and act together against this campaign. Turkey faces the same accusations and courts. Russia and Iran are also targeted. The lawyers of these countries can work together and organize a campaign to tell the truth against this theater.
Footnotes:
1. https://aydinlik.com.tr/vatan-partisi-nden-davutoglu-nun-uygur-kiskirticisi-yol-arkadaslarina-tepki-tescilli-cia-provokatorleri-221218#1
2. https://www.carter-ruck.com/images/uploads/documents/Syria_Report-January_2014.pdf
3. https://geoffreynicefoundation.com/a-report-on-the-legal-avenues-to-deal-withhuman-rights-abuses-in-the-democratic-peoples/
4. https://www.lawsociety.ie/gazette/top-stories/hague-tribunal-to-probe-protestor-deaths-in-iran/
5. https://www.hongkongwatch.org/our-people
6. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/china-organ-harvesting-prisoners-falun-gong-deaths-tribunal-a8962661.html
7. https://www.knowing-our-rights.com/?s=geoffrey+nice
8. https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2021/04/06/2205118/0/en/Self-Storage-and-Moving-Services-Market-to-Reach-126-5-Billion-by-2027.html
9. http://www.compe.cn/english/news/academicevents/102437.html
10. https://lif.blob.core.windows.net/lif/docs/default-source/future-of-iran/2012-future-of-iran-by-hamid-sabi-is-there-a-future-for-iran-s-judiciary.pdf?sfvrsn=0
11. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-rights-organ-harvesting/u-n-urged-to-investigate-organ-harvesting-in-china-idUSKBN1W92FL
12. https://aarifabraham.com/blog/barbarism-is-beneath-us-part-2
13. https://www.barhumanrights.org.uk/bhrc-publishes-new-report-outlining-the-responsibility-of-states-under-international-law-to-uyghurs-and-other-turkic-muslims-in-xinjiang-china/
14. https://www.gcnchambers.co.uk/responsibility-of-states-under-international-law-to-uyghurs-and-other-turkic-muslims-in-xinjiang-china/
15. https://www.diplomates.show/luke-de-pulford/
16. https://www.forbes.com/sites/ewelinaochab/2021/03/26/china-and-the-uk-in-sanctions-war/?sh=51027c105ced