As China is not a signatory to the Rome Statute, which established the ICC, prosecution on the court docket has all the time been a protracted shot. But activists had hoped to convey a case primarily based on actions taken towards Uyghurs residing in Tajikistan and Cambodia, each of that are ICC members.
Bensouda’s workplace has left the file open, which means the ICC may nonetheless pursue a case offered extra proof was offered.
Speaking to the Guardian, Rodney Dixon, the lead barrister within the tried ICC case towards China, mentioned his crew “will be providing highly relevant evidence … in the coming months.”
“We are engaging with the office of the prosecutor as these proceedings go on with the aim of opening a full investigation,” Dixon added.
The message is clear: whereas Bensouda’s resolution might appear to be a win of kinds for China, it highlights the growing pressure over Xinjiang and the willpower of Uyghur teams and different activists to carry Beijing to account.
Leading that cost at a world stage is Washington, the place being powerful on China is by now bipartisan consensus and
quite a few hearings have been held on the scenario in Xinjiang. US President Donald Trump has taken a tough line in the direction of Beijing, and his authorities has
sanctioned a number of Chinese officers allegedly accountable for human rights abuses towards Uyghurs.
Ahead of the US election final month, some activists had expressed issues Joe Biden would take a softer method. But in a
assertion on Xinjiang, the now President-elect denounced the “unspeakable oppression” towards Uyghurs and different ethnic minorities, which he mentioned amounted to “genocide.”
Responding to these feedback, Elijan Anayit, a spokesman for the Xinjiang authorities, mentioned final month that claims of genocide had been “a completely false proposition and a vicious attack on Xinjiang by overseas anti-China forces.”
Anayit pointed to the historic genocide of Indigenous Americans to argue the United States had no standing on this matter, and accused Washington of committing “a serious violation, sacrilege and manipulation” of the United Nations conference towards genocide by concentrating on Beijing on this method.
Yet whereas the US might have geopolitical motivations for holding China to account — and little room to argue the ICC resolution, given Washington too
is not a signatory to the Rome Statute and has even sanctioned Bensouda — it is not alone in talking out over Xinjiang.
In a speech on the UN General Assembly in September, French President Emmanuel Macron
referred to as for an official investigation into Xinjiang. European lawmakers have additionally pushed for concerted motion over the difficulty, together with
potential sanctions towards Chinese officers.
“We will not hesitate to use our democratic clout and put these values of human rights high on the agenda in dialogues with our partners, just as we did at the two summits with Chinese leaders this year,” European Council President Charles Michel
mentioned final month. “We devoted a substantial part of our discussions to the issues of the rule of law in Hong Kong and the protection of minorities in Xinjiang.”
The Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China — a grouping of lots of of lawmakers throughout Europe, North America, Africa, and Asia-Pacific — has additionally
lobbied for worldwide motion over Xinjiang, supporting the
case on the ICC and calling for a UN investigation into the matter.
The pressure comes with China’s international repute plummeting within the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.
A Pew survey in October discovered that unfavorable views of China had reached historic highs in lots of international locations, with a majority in all 14 international locations polled expressing destructive opinions of Beijing.
The most rapid impact of all this lobbying could possibly be on worldwide companies that supply supplies and labor from Xinjiang.
According to a brand new report from Adrian Zenz, a number one scholar on the oppression of Uyghurs, Chinese authorities paperwork and media experiences present that “hundreds of thousands of ethnic minority laborers in Xinjiang are being forced to pick cotton by hand through a coercive state-mandated labor transfer and ‘poverty alleviation’ scheme.”
Earlier this month, the US
blocked cotton imports from Xinjiang over pressured labor issues — allegations China has persistently denied. In his report, Zenz argued there was “evidence for coercive labor related to all cotton produced in Xinjiang,” and mentioned “companies should be required to thoroughly investigate the role of Chinese cotton in their supply chains, even if any related production takes place outside China.”
Numerous main clothes retailers use cotton sourced from Xinjiang, and have already come below pressure for this apply. The newest findings may spark some to reevaluate their provide chains, or immediate different governments to take motion and power corporations’ palms.
The probability of growing worldwide criticism having an impact on Beijing is far smaller, nonetheless.
In September, Chinese President Xi Jinping
defended his insurance policies in Xinjiang as “completely correct.” And because the ICC resolution this week reveals, holding international locations to account is typically simpler mentioned than finished.
PreetiJha 
Vaibhav Kapoor