During the 45th session of the UN Human Rights Council, China's Permanent Mission to the United Nations Office at Geneva and Other International Organizations in Switzerland and the China Society for Human Rights Studies (CSHRS) held three webinars themed “Counterterrorism, Deradicalization and Human Rights Protection,” “Poverty Alleviation and Human Rights Protection” and “Xinjiang’s Population and Human Rights”. Officials from other countries’ permanent missions to Geneva, special aides of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and the UN Human Rights Council and representatives of non-governmental organizations joined the meetings.
The rights to subsistence and development are the basic rights of humankind. Poverty is one of the factors that lead to terrorism. The series of online meetings was set to discuss the role of counterterrorism and deradicalization in human rights protection, share China’s experience in poverty alleviation and give a true picture of the population growth and human rights protection in northwest China’s Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region.
Chen Xu, Ambassador of China’s Permanent Mission to Geneva, stressed that the international community should have a sense of community with a shared future to implement the UN Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy and promote multilateralism and international cooperation, and enhance abilities to fight terrorism, radicalization and protect human rights. Attendees agreed that counterterrorism is the common responsibility for all countries and we should neither allow double standards nor politicize the anti-terrorism efforts. Instead, we ought to strengthen cooperation among countries and regions to share good experience and effective measures on counterterrorism.
China has largely contained the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic and resumed work and production in an orderly way, becoming one of the few economies in the world that can realize positive growth. “China sticks to the people-oriented principle of development and has made remarkable efforts on poverty reduction,” said Zhuo Yue, an academician of the Royal Society of Canada.
“Since the founding of the PRC, especially in recent years, Xinjiang has seen steady improvement of people’s living standards and human rights protection. It is noticeable that Xinjiang has made great achievements in population development and human rights protection,” said Fu Zitang, vice president of the CSHRS and president of the Southwest University of Political Science & Law (SWUPL). Facts have proven that shaking off poverty can not only eradicate the hotbed of extremism and terrorism but also underpin Xinjiang’s future development. Social stability and solidarity of all ethnic groups in Xinjiang are the most powerful rebuttal of human rights smears against China.
