Exiled East Turkistan authorities move to UN to designate China as 'colonial power'

Washington, May 6 The East Turkistan Government-in-Exile (ETGE) submitted a petition to the United Nations Special Committee on Decolonisation (C-24) requesting that the General Assembly designate China as the "occupying power" over East Turkistan.

The 25-page petition, submitted jointly by the ETGE and the East Turkistan National Movement (ETNM) on Tuesday, states, "The era of colonialism has not ended. It is being legislated."

The petition seeks inscription of East Turkistan, also known as the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China, as a 'Non-Self-Governing Territory'.

According to the ETGE, such a move would trigger a binding international framework obligating the UN to oversee East Turkistan's path toward self-determination. The exiled authorities said that no state or entity has ever formally challenged China as a "colonial power" before any UN body.

"More than eighty nations achieved their independence through the decolonisation framework. Today, the people of East Turkistan formally assert that same right before the United Nations," said Mamtimin Ala, President of the ETGE.

Asserting that the very existing human rights accountability mechanism in global agencies has failed, the exiled authorities said that the "genocide" of Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and other Turkic peoples in Xinjiang is entering its thirteenth year later this month.

The exiled authorities highlighted that "mass internment, credibly documented organ harvesting, forced sterilisation, and the separation of nearly one million children from their families" by the Chinese authorities continue unabated in the region.

It added that China's own five-year plan for the "occupied territory" projected 13.75 million forced labour transfers between 2021 and 2025.

The ETGE referred to warnings by UN Special Rapporteurs earlier this year that actual numbers of labour transfers have exceeded official projections and that such practices "may amount to enslavement as a crime against humanity".

"The ongoing genocide is rooted in China's colonial occupation of East Turkistan. Decolonisation and the restoration of our independence are the only effective guarantees of our people's survival," said Salih Hudayar, Foreign Minister of the ETGE and President of the ETNM.

The ETGE alleged that China is not only committing "genocide" but also working to make its "colonial domination irreversible".

It cited the 'Law on Promoting Ethnic Unity and Progress', adopted by the National People's Congress in Beijing on March 12, which the exiled authorities said codified "the erasure of distinct peoples and cultures into a single Chinese identity."

In the petition, the ETGE called for addressing "China's conflict of interest as a permanent Security Council member and participant in the very committee mandated to oversee decolonisation."

--IANS

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