UN chief Antonio Guterres rejects claim he did not condemn China over Muslims detained in Xinjiang
- ‘I don’t think anyone has been more persistent and more clear in talking to the Chinese authorities in relation to this issue’, he tells human rights groups
- Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International among groups calling for UN secretary general to do more
“I don’t think anyone has been more persistent and more clear in talking to the Chinese authorities in relation to this issue than myself,” he said on Wednesday. “It is absolutely not true that I’ve only done discreet diplomacy.”
The official said that on his visit to Beijing in April, “not only did I raise the issue, but I made it public”.
The five rights groups said in a letter to Guterres circulated on Tuesday that he would make an important contribution to addressing “one of the most pressing human rights issues of our time” by speaking out against China’s internment of the Uygurs and members of other predominantly Muslim ethnic groups and calling for the immediate closure of the detention camps.
The letter was signed by Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, the International Commission of Jurists, the International Federation for Human Rights and the World Uygur Conference.
Guterres said he told the Chinese “that it is very important to act in a way that each community feels that their identity is respected and that they belong, at the same time, to the society as a whole”.