ICC rejects Uygur calls to investigate China for genocide

Exiled Uygurs had accused Beijing of locking more than 1 million people from mostly Muslim minorities in re-education camps and of forcibly sterilising women

Chief prosecutor’s office says it is unable to act because of a lack of jurisdiction on Chinese soil

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A Chinese police officer takes his position by the road near what is officially called a vocational education centre in Xinjiang in September 2018. Photo: Reuters

Published: 4:14am, 15 Dec 2020Updated: 11:30pm, 15 Dec 2020

International Criminal Court prosecutors have rejected calls by exiled Uygurs to investigate China for alleged genocide and crimes against humanity, the chief prosecutor’s office said in a report on Monday.

The Uygurs handed a huge dossier of evidence to the court in July accusing China of locking more than 1 million Uygurs and other mostly Muslim minorities in re-education camps and of forcibly sterilising women.

But the office of prosecutor Fatou Bensouda said it was unable to act because the alleged acts happened on the territory of China, which is not a signatory to The Hague-based ICC.

In its annual report, Bensouda’s office said “this precondition for the exercise of the court’s territorial jurisdiction did not appear to be met with respect to the majority of the crimes alleged”.

Chief prosecutor Fatou Bensouda is seen at the International Criminal Court in The Hague in April 2018. Photo: AP

There was also “no basis to proceed at this time” on separate claims of forced deportations of Uygurs back to China from Tajikistan and Cambodia, the ICC report said.