Canada urged to define Uighur abuses in China as genocide

OTTAWA — Irwin Cotler, a former Liberal justice minister, is urging Canada’s Parliament to become the first to define China’s “mass atrocities” against the country’s Uighur minority as genocide.

The international human rights lawyer made the challenge to parliamentarians Monday during his testimony before a House of Commons subcommittee studying the reports of abuses, including mass incarceration and forced sterilization, targeting Uighur Muslims and ethnic Kazakhs in northwestern China.

China has called its facilities in Xinjiang "vocational education and training centers."

“Indifference in such mass atrocities, let alone genocide, always means coming down on the side of the victimizer and not on the side of the victims,” Cotler, now the chair of the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights, said at an appearance during which he drew a comparison to the Rwandan genocide 26 years ago.

“What makes that genocide so unspeakable is that it was preventable. Nobody could say we did not know [about Rwanda]. We knew but we did not act. Just as now with regard to the Uighurs, nobody could say that we do not know. We know and we must act.”

Cotler said a few years ago Canada’s Parliament was the first to characterize what was happening to the Rohingyas in Myanmar as a genocide.

Call for sanctions: Cotler also called on Canada to impose sanctions on Chinese “perpetrators” under the Magnitsky Act. Earlier this month, the U.S. Department of the Treasury announced sanctions against a Chinese government entity and four officials in connection with Uighur rights abuses.

Cotler noted how Canada has slapped Magnitsky sanctions on officials from Russia, Venezuela, Myanmar, Saudi Arabia and South Sudan.

“I cannot understand how we have yet to impose any Magnitsky sanctions on those officials involved in crimes against humanity and, arguably, in crimes against humanity that are constitutive of acts of genocide,” said Cotler, who has served as chair of the Inter-Parliamentary Group of Justice for Sergei Magnitsky.

Earlier this month, Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister François-Philippe Champagne was asked in the House of Commons if the Trudeau government was prepared to impose Magnitsky sanctions on those involved in human rights violations against the Uighurs, in Hong Kong or elsewhere in China.

“Yes, we are considering all the options when it comes to standing up for human rights,” said Champagne, who had earlier noted: "We are deeply disturbed by the reports that we have seen. We are consulting with the international community. Canada will continue, as it always has, to speak up and stand up for human rights around the world, and that will be the case when it comes to the Uighurs."

What other panelists said: The subcommittee was due to hear from more than a dozen witnesses Monday on the Uighur issue.

Rayhan Asat, president of the American Turkic International Lawyers Association, told members about her brother, a Uighur, who vanished after returning to the Xinjiang region four years ago.

“As I’m speaking out at this forum today, I’m terrified whether my brother will be subjected to torture, water-boarding or electrocution as these are common patterns of cruel treatment detainees have to endure in these internment camps,” Asat said.

“I think we do have a very strong case for genocide … I think the Chinese government is perfectly laying the groundwork for eradicating the Uighur people as the whole.”

She said the most agonizing element is that her brother’s “forced labor” has likely contributed to global commerce — and that corporations are unknowingly or knowingly profiting off of these products.

Why Cotler’s arguments may resonate: Cotler, who was Canada’s justice minister and attorney general from 2003 to 2006, was highly respected during his 16 years as a parliamentarian, even by political rivals.

The McGill University emeritus law professor also has a noted reputation on the world stage, where his work has included serving as counsel for prisoners of conscience like former South African president Nelson Mandela.

What’s next? On Tuesday, the subcommittee is scheduled to continue its study of the Uighur human rights situation. Parliamentarians should expect to hear more about the Magnitsky sanctions.

The witness list includes Bill Browder, the American financier who led the international campaign for Magnitsky legislation, which is named for his former lawyer, Sergei Magnitsky. Browder made the push after Magnitsky was arrested in Russia following his investigation into corruption and later died in custody.