Law

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    [post_content] => Whether organizations like the UN will meaningfully press China on the issue is not clear.

Humans have a real appetite for mass murder. The twentieth century produced at least eight genocides, and the last 21 years have featured three more. Genocides are now a casual part of politics, unfolding with little consequence or objection. Most troubling is confronting China’s systematic campaign against its Muslim Uyghur population, which is coming to a head after decades of discriminatory and abusive policies. The logic of the American-led War on Terror helped justify a tsunami of abusive policies against Muslims worldwide. The genocide in Xinjiang is only its logical conclusion.

The U.S., U.K. and some European states now confirm that China is committing genocide in Xinjiang. But beyond that are stillness and silence. The silence is loudest from leaders and countries who once professed solidarity for oppressed Muslims everywhere. This is partly a function of the authoritarianism in influential Muslim countries like Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Turkey—calling to protect the rights of Muslims elsewhere might give their own populations ideas. And anyway, Saudi Arabia is occupied with butchering journalists and Yemenis, the UAE is busy making peace with Israel (don’t mind the apartheid), and Turkey would rather deport Uyghurs back to China.

The ugly truth is that for all who wonder what they would have done as genocides unfolded in their time, the answer is largely nothing. The videos of Uyghur men shackled and blindfolded and put on trains to unknown destinations, the immense surveillance and detention infrastructure China uses to enforce obedience to Beijing, Uyghur women relating their rapes and abuse in internment camps, the fates of Uyghurs who have fled only for authorities to imprison their family members, the sharp decrease in Uyghur population numbers and birth rates—they are not a secret. Beijing has countered questions and criticisms from other states with unsubtle propaganda campaigns, outright hostility and assertions that it is fighting Islamic extremism.

No one knows how to confront a rising, antagonistic China. Global trade, commerce and financial markets all depend on a stable relationship with Beijing. Multilateral institutions like the United Nations no longer provide a meaningful forum to address vast crises and deal with atrocities like genocide as the UN Charter dictates. In any event, China is committed to a new multilateralism in the Eastern hemisphere where it can shape and influence the work of newer groupings such as the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and ASEAN. Moreover, through its flagship “Belt and Road Initiative” the Chinese government hopes to forge strong economic and political ties throughout Asia with billions in infrastructure investment. With these layered ties to its neighbors China is looking for more than markets: it needs as many allies as possible in a world where China’s authoritarianism is deepening.

Irrespective of how powerful China is or isn’t at this moment, it is powerful enough that it can subjugate a population of 14 million people, send one million of them to camps, and eradicate their religion and cultural identity without any repercussion from global actors. What’s clearer is that no one is prepared to find a way to end it. Beijing remains impervious, and hostile, to criticism about how its laws and policies violate political freedoms and basic rights, and especially so on Xinjiang. The most successful public campaigns that have managed to highlight an aspect of the Xinjiang crisis is the use of cotton harvested through forced Uyghur labor. As it turns out, major brands including Zara, Nike and Apple have all come under scrutiny for relying on Chinese supply chains that may well be relying on this labor too.

Not that many people are criticizing. Three years ago, the world looked on as Myanmar’s army displaced the country’s entire Muslim Rohingya population into neighboring Bangladesh, committing war crimes so monstrous that the UN deemed the campaign genocide. Despite an international outcry, the operation to push out the Rohingya from western Burma succeeded. Most Rohingya refugees remain in Bangladesh, living in squalid camps that lack basic amenities and infrastructure, without access to livelihoods or any prospect of returning safely to Myanmar.

Noting Henry Kissinger’s facetious and lazy advice not to tangle with China on human rights issues, the enormous question remains: how is the ongoing genocide in Xinjiang going to end? Who will end it? Does it end in mass graves and gas chambers, as with genocides before? Or is there a way, slow but painful, to push China toward a different relationship with is minority communities? Who is willing to make this a priority in state-to-state relations with China?

Perhaps it would be easier if the Muslims of Xinjiang had not been Muslim. Muslims have been the targets of so many wars in the last century that the notion of Muslims dying in far-off places—Chechnya, Palestine, Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan just in the latter half of the 20th century—is blasé and predictable. Even a state that traffics as aggressively in its Muslim identity as Pakistan has nothing to say about Xinjiang, despite the fact that the beleaguered province sits on the other side of Pakistan’s eastern border.

The US and European states have seriously damaged their own standing when criticizing the conduct of other states. The debacles in Afghanistan and Iraq, apart from destroying those countries, set a comfortable precedent for states with total contempt for the concept of human rights. One lesson of those wars was that no one would be held accountable for overthrowing a government, war crimes or any serious abuses, especially if they were from the occupying army. Such reckless disregard for longstanding international norms about how states conduct themselves in war meant that Russia and Iran could act as violently as they chose when intervening in Syria’s war to sustain Bashar al-Assad. The global institutions meant to protect civilians, and investigate and prosecute war crimes, have largely proven themselves useless.

The Chinese government also looks at events like the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and concluded its best defense against criticism for its gross human rights violations is to point that China’s opponents have no credibility on these points. This comes alongside a greater confidence that China can engage with the world on its own terms, and one of those terms is that outsiders have no say in China’s domestic affairs. The response to this cannot be silence.

The Chinese government works very hard to shut down any political discussion about Xinjiang, most recently demanding other UN member states not attend a discussion about the province, organized by the U.S., U.K., and Germany. Whether organizations like the UN will meaningfully press China on the issue is not clear. In the meantime, what of the world’s billion or so Muslims? Beyond a few Uyghur diaspora groups, Muslim advocacy organizations and governments are quiet. Confronting China on Xinjiang will have real material costs for states who want to sway Beijing’s policy, but ignoring an ongoing genocide means the destruction of an entire people is acceptable state conduct. That seems a much higher price to pay.
    [post_title] => We are watching real time genocide in China
    [post_excerpt] => No one knows how to confront a rising, antagonistic China. Global trade, commerce and financial markets all depend on a stable relationship with Beijing.
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    [post_content] => 'Incredibly vague' wording of a parliamentary bill would 'effectively put the U.K. on par with some of the more repressive countries in the world.'

In April 2019, activists chained themselves to a pink boat in the middle of Oxford Circus, one of London’s most famous intersections. A lime green Extinction Rebellion flag flew from the top of the boat, and on one side was the slogan “Tell the truth.” Traffic at one of the city’s busiest intersections came to a grinding halt, as protesters occupied the road.

All across the city, Extinction Rebellion caused disruption. They occupied Waterloo Bridge, obstructed trains, and glued themselves across the entrance of the London Stock Exchange. More actions followed throughout the year. The purpose was to push the government into taking serious action on the climate crisis. Approve of their methods or not, these bold actions forced the world to pay attention.

Now, the U.K. government is debating a new bill that would give police more powers at protests in England and Wales. In the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, people breaching police rules at demonstrations will face increased penalties, and the police would have new powers to control static and single person protests. They could impose start and finish times, and enforce maximum noise levels if a protest could cause “significant impact” for people nearby or “serious disruption” to a business.

The bill stipulates that the rules would also apply to a protest of just one person. Theoretically, someone standing with a sign and being disruptive could be fined up to £2,500. The bill would also stop vehicular access to Parliament being blocked by demonstrations, and anyone refusing to move when asked by the police would be causing an offence.

In summer 2020, London came to a standstill for another reason. Following the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, the Black Lives Matter movement marched through the city, forcing the country to pay attention to racial injustice.

The Home Office fact sheet refers to the Extinction Rebellion protests before outlining any measures. Following their actions, Home Secretary Priti Patel said that Extinction Rebellion was an emerging threat, and called the Black Lives Matter protests “dreadful”.

The bill, which covers a whole range of issues beyond just protests, passed its second reading in the House of Commons on March 15, just two days after police were criticized for their handling of the peaceful vigil for Sarah Everard,  the 33 year-old London woman who was murdered while walking home through a park on the evening of March 3. Police used physical force to break up the Clapham Common vigil, which became a call for changes that would keep women safer (a later report stated that the police “acted appropriately”, but the report has also been criticized). Since then, ‘Kill the Bill’ protests have erupted across the country. The date for the next step, committee stage, is yet to be announced.
The right to cause disruption
Organizations and prominent individuals from across England and Wales have signed a letter to the Home Secretary and Secretary of State for Justice, sharing their concerns.

One of those organizations is Netpol, the Network for Police Monitoring. In a phone interview, Netpol’s Campaigns Coordinator Kevin Blowe told The Conversationalist that the bill cracks down on protests which are non-violent, but disruptive.

“What we've always said is that all protests are disruptive to some degree. If that wasn't the case, it wouldn't be a protest,” he said.

The sections of the bill aimed at stopping people causing serious disruption would place “subjective, wholly disproportionate power in the hands of the police,” he said. 

Beyond this, Home Secretary Priti Patel would have the power to define what exactly constitutes serious disruption. There would be no parliamentary debate.

“The police already have extensive powers. The idea that somehow things are swung too far in favour of the protesters is simply not true,” Blowe said.

With a strong Conservative majority, he believes this bill is likely to pass a parliamentary vote in some form.

The U.K., like many other countries, has a history of change-making through disruptive protest. In the early 1900s, when peaceful protest had done nothing to gain women the right to vote, Emmeline Pankhurst led the Suffragettes in a campaign of civil disobedience. They smashed windows, started riots, and snuck into parliament. Perhaps most famously, Emily Davison threw herself under the King’s horse. The campaign led to a parliamentary commission to study the issue of women’s suffrage; and in 1918, British women finally won the right to vote. 

With such a strong history of protest, will this bill, if it becomes law, stop people from being disruptive?

“It's not going to stop people from going out in the streets and campaigning around climate change. It's not going to stop people coming out, because they're outraged about racial injustice, or indeed protesting around the expansion of police powers,” Blowe said. Protest, he added, “is the only way that people see as having any chance of getting the Government to listen.”

More likely, said Blowe, more people will end up being arrested, while certain social and political movements will be criminalized.

In an email statement, a Home Office spokesperson said: “It is wrong to claim these measures will stop people from carrying out their civic right to protest. People will still be able to protest, but they cannot be permitted to trample on the rights of local businesses and communities.”

Members of Parliament who represent other parties have been vocal about the damage the bill could do.

The Liberal Democrat Spokesperson for Home Affairs, MP Alistair Carmichael tweeted: “This crackdown on protests is dangerous and draconian and must be opposed.”

Meanwhile Labour MP Zarah Sultana called the bill a “recipe for repression” on Twitter, and Jenny Jones, Green Party member of the House of Lords (who’s also an activist) tweeted: “We need to understand that our rights and freedoms are under threat from our Govt.”

Netpol, along with other organizations, said that the whole 307 page bill needs to be opposed. In fact, ahead of this bill, Netpol put forward their own Charter for Freedom of Assembly Rights, asking for transparency of policing at protests.
A global issue
Article 19, an organization defending freedom of expression and information, also signed the joint letter speaking out against the bill. 

“The incredibly vague and broad language that's in the U.K. policing bill will effectively put the United Kingdom on par with some of the more repressive countries in the world,” says Executive Director Quinn McCew in a Zoom interview.

She said that what’s happening in the U.K. is part of a broader global issue, with governments trying to control civil society and people's ability to hold them to account. She pointed at Hong Kong, which saw sustained street demonstrations to protest the Chinese government’s repressive restrictions on freedom of expression, as one of the worst examples of government suppression: “Incredibly draconian laws put in place there have effectively cut off the legs of the protest movement.”

She also speaks about Kenya, where Covid-19 emergency powers have been used to silence protests against police brutality.

“The justification for clamping down on and using violence against those protesters was exactly the same as the justification that the U.K. Government and the police ultimately gave for the violence they used against the protesters at the vigil in Clapham Common,” McCew said.

Aside from the impact on freedom to protest in England and Wales, she believes the bill could send ripples around the world, with other nations following the U.K.’s lead.

The right to freedom of peaceful assembly, or the right to protest, is enshrined in laws across the world. It’s included in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. And it’s not just the U.K. battling with new protest laws.

In November 2020, the French government put forward a law that would criminalize the act of sharing images or videos of police. This ban on filming police, activists warn, could allow police brutality to go unchecked. The tragic final moments of George Floyd’s life were caught on camera and have provided vital evidence in the ongoing trial of Derek Chauvin, the police officer who has been charged with his murder, but this is not true for other police killings—like that of Adama Traoré, who died in the custody of French police in 2016.

While the law goes through various stages and rewrites, protesters are opposing it across the country. 

Even without this new law, demonstrators face rubber bullets, tear gas, and weapons used by police. There’s not just a risk of criminalization and fines, but of serious injury.
Defending protest with protest
In June 2020, Black Lives Matter demonstrators pulled down a statue of 17th century slave trader Edward Colston from its plinth in Bristol, as crowds cheered. Its next destination—Bristol Harbour. If the new bill goes through, anyone defacing a monument could face a 10 year prison sentence, and the events of summer 2020 are cited in the bill’s explanatory notes as the reason for this change in law.

Following the Clapham Common vigil and the bill’s second reading, protests continue across the country, with the issue of women’s safety high on the agenda. Both protesters and MPs have drawn comparisons between the protections proposed for monuments and statues, and the protections that women are so desperately demanding.

Interviewed by Sky News,  Labour MP David Lammy said: “It is the case here in the U.K., that the starting tariff in prison is five years for rape [...] Why are we saying that pulling down a statue is more important than a woman’s body?”

It’s a point that McCew has made, too.

“Looking at what happened during the policing of the vigil for Sarah Everard, and looking at the language that's in the policing bill, it's quite clear that there's a higher level of support for protecting a slaveholding monument than there is for women's rights and women's ability to speak,” she said.

If this bill goes through, McCew says the bill could lead to even greater civil unrest. The two biggest global issues—the climate crisis and the call for racial justice—are the very two issues that the police and government are trying to restrict. Rather than fewer disruptive protests, there could be more.
    [post_title] => The right to protest is under threat in Britain
    [post_excerpt] => 'If it didn't disrupt, it wouldn't be a protest': free speech activists push back against a legislative bill that would give British police sweeping powers to limit the right to public protest.
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