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Weekly Brief December 8th

Weekly Brief December 8th

World Uyghur Congress, 8 December 2017

Concerning New Counter-Espionage Rules Further Increase Powers of Chinese State Security Agents

New rules to China’s Counter-Espionage laws were adopted by the Chinese government on Wednesday, 6 December 2017. The new roles specify how China’s counter-espionage laws, which first were adopted in November 2014, should be implemented, as part of a series of new legal reforms pushed by Xi Jinping to counter perceived threats to national security.

The new rules give the Chinese state security agents sweeping new powers to arrest and investigate individuals they suspect of espionage. They give the security agents the authority to bar foreigners from entering the country if they have made negative comments about the Chinese government and to arrest and deport them if they are already in China. The new rules also widen the definition of espionage to include punishments for acts such as ‘using religion or cults to harm national security’. These WUC is very concerned with these measures. They will certainly be used to silence critics of the Chinese government domestically and abroad, as well as leading for further repression of the Uyghur people and further restrictions on religious freedom.

World Uyghur Congress Sends Letter To Canadian PM Ahead of Visit

The World Uyghur Congress sent a letter to the Canadian Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, last week ahead of his anticipated visit to China to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping. The Trudeau government has been relatively silent on human rights issues in the past, but has emphasised that its “quiet diplomacy” has been effective in terms of moving forward on these issues.

With ever increasing repression in China and any dissent being met with force and violence, we rely on states who to speak up about human rights. It is the duty of the international community to respectfully call out those states that fail to live up to international human rights norms.