International Criminal Court officials won’t open an investigation into China’s repression of Uighur Muslims due to a lack of jurisdiction in the case.
“Not good news for us,” World Uighur Congress President Dolkun Isa told the Washington Examiner before acknowledging that “the ICC is not in a position to review China.”
ICC officials affirmed their position by rebuffing a request from a different Uighur Muslim diaspora group known as the East Turkestan Government in Exile, or the ETGE. Lawyers for the plaintiffs hoped that the court would mobilize against forced deportation of Uighurs from neighboring Cambodia and Tajikistan, which are ICC member-states, but ICC officials maintained that those deportations fell below the threshold of an international crime even if they are a “precursor” for the abuses in mainland China.
“While the conduct of such officials may have served as a precursor to the subsequent alleged commission of crimes on the territory of China, over which the Court lacks jurisdiction,” the ICC report said. “The conduct occurring on the territory of States Parties does not appear, on the information available, to fulfill material elements of the crime of deportation under article 7(1)(d) of the Statute.”
The diaspora group hopes to convince the court to reconsider by gathering more information about the forced deportations.
“The prosecutor will be receiving further evidence of the rounding up of Uighurs abroad by the Chinese Government, and forcing them back into occupied East Turkistan (Xinjiang),” the ETGE wrote on Tuesday in response to the ICC announcement. “The Complaint makes clear that the crimes committed against the Uighur people have been widespread and systematic.”
In recent years, Chinese officials have established mass “reeducation” camps for Uighur Muslims, an ethnic and religious minority the persecution of which Beijing has sought to justify as counterterrorism. Uighur activists looked to the ICC as an alternative to the United Nations, where China’s seat on the Security Council and political clout with authoritarian states enables Beijing to block most initiatives.
“It does, of course, broadly reflect the limitations of the multilateral institutions. It reflects limited ability of the international community to do something,” Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation senior fellow Adrian Zenz said. “The reason for [approaching] the ICC is the impotence of the United Nations. The main mechanism to do something like that really should be the United Nations, and especially the Human Rights Council.”
Zenz, an internationally respected investigator of China’s repression of the Uighurs, is the author of a new report that Chinese officials have forced “at least 570,000” people to pick cotton in Xinjiang. The report points to the most viable means of accountability, he argues, as the cotton is picked by forced labor for export to Western countries and companies.
“The pressure has to be on the fashion industry to do something,” Zenz said. “Now, we don’t necessarily need to wait for slow and unwilling politicians to move. Now, it could be in the hands of citizens and consumers and advocacy groups.”
Isa agreed. “We hope it is not business as usual,” he said. “All the companies in Western countries must stop business [with Xinjiang].”
