released a series of joint statements citing growing concern over China’s respect for

human rights. According to Reuters, the documents accuse the Chinese government of covering

up disappearances, censoring opposition and fostering a biased judicial system, among

a slew of other violations. Human rights abuses have reportedly escalated in China since President

Xi Jinping took office in 2014. So, what are China’s human rights violations?

Well, China is an authoritarian state, ruled under a one-party system. As such, its government

has historically valued state sovereignty over individual rights. In fact, China didn’t

even officially recognize human rights until the early 1990’s, after the fallout of the

Tiananmen Square democratic movement. Their first major treaty, the “White Papers”,

endowed all citizens with the rights to free speech and assembly, and specifically outlaws

any media censorship. In total, the government has signed and ratified more than 20 international

treaties on human rights. However, China has sidestepped many of these international norms,

and the government’s attitude on the matter has largely gone unchanged.

In China today, the most frequent victims of human rights violations are critics of

the government, like journalists, lawyers, artists and activists. The state is known

to harass, imprison and even torture opposition members, in many cases without just cause.

For instance in 2015, the Chinese government arbitrarily detained or questioned more than

200 human rights lawyers and activists whom they suspected of undermining the ruling party.

Experts say the crackdown was part of the state’s larger effort to dismantle the “rights

defense” movement, which is a group of intellectuals defending individual rights through legal

action and activism. By the end of the year, 25 people were missing or in custody.

China’s human rights violations are often difficult to prosecute, as the county’s

legal system has been designed to limit individual rights. This was exemplified 2015, when China

drafted a series of laws that effectively silenced dissidents, under the guise of expanding

national security. Among them is an anti-terror law that gives authorities sweeping powers

to combat militants and separatists, including the right to monitor private communications.

Critics of the law say its definition of “terrorism” is alarmingly broad, and could hinder freedom

of speech and religion for China’s religious and ethnic minorities. China has also introduced

legislation that expands the state’s power to regulate and monitor foreign human rights

organizations.

This is all under the backdrop of China’s seemingly endless war against the internet.

Although most of the Western web is already blocked under China’s “great firewall”,

the government does permit certain sites, albeit under tight supervision. For instance

in 2014, the state passed new regulations on China’s primary social media site, WeChat,

barring private users from sharing news, current events, or anything that undermined the socialist

system. The state has since shut down millions of accounts that have not met those requirements.

In a an open letter to President Xi Jinping, Western powers cited these and other infringements

on human rights as not only immoral, but harmful to China’s own economy. They said the abuses

have created “a climate of uncertainty” for investors, who are particularly important

to China during its economic decline. Whether their concerns have any effect on the country’s

systematic human rights violations remains to be seen.

And China’s problems don’t end at their border. Learn about some of China’s controversies

in regards to terrorism in Pakistan by checking out this video from our friends at China Uncensored. Thanks for watching Seeker

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