Xinjiang: Forced Labour

Rehman Chishti Excerpts

Tuesday 12th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

I share the outrage of the hon. Lady’s constituents and I thank her for her support. We have laid out a suite of measures. I have explained what we are doing in the Human Rights Council, the United Nations General Assembly Third Committee.

We keep working with our international partners, but, as the hon. Lady will have noted, while we are leading the way a lot of countries are nervous of speaking out, partly because of China’s economic clout. We have certainly been having conversations with many countries, including countries with larger Muslim populations than our own, about why they are not more outspoken on this issue.

One of the things that I think would help, given China’s blanket denial, is to get the UN Human Rights Commissioner into Xinjiang, so there can be no doubt, no quibbling and no question that these violations are taking place. Having an authoritative and independent party like the UN Human Rights Commissioner conduct that kind of review would help to raise the kind of coalition of the like-minded that the hon. Lady talks about.

[Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con) [V]]

I very much welcome the Foreign Secretary’s statement on dealing with the horrific situation in Xinjiang. With regards to the United Kingdom’s leadership on the matter and the further actions it can take, the UK will be hosting the G7 later this year and will have the presidency of the Security Council next month, in February. Will this issue and the wider topic of freedom of religion or belief be put on the agenda of both conferences and events to show the United Kingdom’s strong leadership and to take firm, decisive action?

[Dominic Raab]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend’s work as special envoy for freedom of religion or belief. I can assure him, without divulging too much of the agenda in advance, that human rights will be at the forefront of our leadership this year—our presidency of the UN Security Council, our G7 presidency and more generally—because we believe that the UK has a crucial role to play in promoting open societies, including on human rights, but also in defending public goods in areas such as climate change and covid response.