China presents its take on human rights at global forum in Beijing
Gathering is Beijing’s latest bid to showcase what it sees as the strengths of its authoritarian political system
Hundreds of participants attended the opening of a human rights forum in Beijing on Thursday in the latest instalment of China’s energetic drive to showcase what it considers the strengths of its authoritarian political system under President Xi Jinping.
Beijing’s new outreach comes as the US turns inward under President Donald Trump, who has set aside traditional US advocacy of democracy and human rights in favour of an “America first” approach that has seen Washington withdraw from key forums from the Paris climate agreement to negotiations on a UN migration compact.
The South-South Human Rights Forum, drawing some 300 participants from over 50 mostly developing countries, follows a conference of political parties last weekend in Beijing also attended by hundreds of delegates, some of whom sung the praises of Communist Party rule. The gathering also comes on the heels of a twice-a-decade party congress in October, at which Xi declared that China now stood “tall and firm in the east” and had entered a new era seeing China “moving closer to centre stage and making greater contributions to mankind”.
Addressing Thursday’s opening session, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said the party congress had “identified the goal of forging a new field in international relations and building a community of shared future for mankind”.
“This is China’s answer to the question of where human society is heading, and it has also presented opportunities for the development of the human rights cause,” Wang said.