A large coalition of religious leaders, scholars and human rights advocates urge Congress to ensure American dollars are not funding oppression in China.

WASHINGTON, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, USA, September 2, 2020 /EINPresswire.com/ -- This week a coalition of 150 organizations, religious leaders, scholars and human rights advocates who are participants in the International Religious Freedom Roundtable (IRF Roundtable) (www.irfroundtable.org) in Washington, DC, sent a signed multi-faith letter to Members of Congress imploring them to support the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (H.R.6210/S.3471). The letter briefly stated the situation of oppression in China and urged the Members to contact Representative Jim McGovern (D-MA) and Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL), the sponsors of the bills. The letter briefly stated the situation of oppression in China and urged the Members to contact Representative Jim McGovern (D-MA) and Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL), the sponsors of the bills.

The letter exposes forced labor programs, a chilling component of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) brutal campaign of repression of the Xinjiang region’s Muslim ethnic group in northeast China. It is estimated that over 1 million Muslims are in “reeducation” camps, separated from families, receiving enforced indoctrination and experiencing torture. The spread of the persecution is not only in the camps but throughout the area.

Reports in the form of firsthand accounts, video footage and studies have been leaking out of China over the last decade regarding the ever-increasing suppression of the Uyghur religious/ethnic population. In March 2020, the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) published a report, “Uyghurs for sale: ‘Re-education’, forced labour and surveillance beyond Xinjiang,” which identified 83 foreign and Chinese companies as allegedly, directly or indirectly, benefiting from the use of Uyghur workers outside Xinjiang through potentially abusive labor transfer programs.

On March 1, 2020, the Australian Strategic Policy Institute issued a lengthy report stating, “Under conditions that strongly suggest forced labour, Uyghurs are working in factories that are in the supply chains of at least 82 well-known global brands in the technology, clothing and automotive sectors, including Apple, BMW, Gap, Huawei, Nike, Samsung, Sony and Volkswagen.” https://www.aspi.org.au/report/uyghurs-sale

In response to documentation and information about the horrific violations occurring, many faiths and religious freedom organizations including 21Wilberforce, Anti-Defamation League, Boat People SOS, Campaign for Uyghurs, China Aid Association, Church of Scientology National Affairs Office, Indian American Muslim Council, Institute on Religion and Democracy, International Christian Concern, Jubilee Campaign, Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission and more than 100 others, signed onto a letter urging the US Congress to take actions regarding US trade in the area. These groups work together regularly on religious freedom persecution issues around the world as participants of the International Religious Freedom (IRF) Roundtable.

Rev. Susan Taylor from the Church of Scientology National Affairs Office in Washington, DC, an active member of the IRF Roundtable, stated, “It is up to each of us to stand up for those who cannot speak out for themselves. Religious and ethnic suppression must cease. Shoulder to shoulder we can make a difference.”

The Church of Scientology has since its inception stood for freedom of religion and human rights for all as stated in its creed written by L. Ron Hubbard in 1954.

The multi-faith letter argues that the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act would safeguard American consumers from unwittingly supporting the CCP’s oppression. Key provisions of the act would create the presumption that goods produced in the Xinjiang Region are made with forced labor and prohibited from importation into the US under the Tariff Act of 1930, unless there is “clear and convincing evidence” that the goods were not made with forced labor. It would also hold foreign parties accountable by enabling sanctions on those who knowingly participate in the importation of the products emerging from forced labor.

Scores of reports, firsthand and otherwise, on the torturous situation of the Uyghurs in the Xinjiang Region have come out from the US State Department, US Commission on International Religious Freedom, the Uyghur Human Rights Project, and the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre, as well many media outlets including ABC TV News in Australia and the New York Times.

China, an original signatory to the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights (https://www.humanrights.com/what-are-human-rights/universal-declaration-of-human-rights/) in 1948, continues to flagrantly violate the document’s very principles despite publicly endorsing it on the Declaration’s 60th Anniversary in 2008.


References:
https://findit.state.gov/search?query=uyghur&affiliate=dos_stategov
https://www.uscirf.gov/search/site/uyghurs
https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/ad-aspi/2020-03/Uyghurs%20for%20sale_Final.pdf - Report: Uyghurs for sale: ‘Re-education’, forced labour and surveillance beyond Xinjiang
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1jphCR6KMvzh-4Iw58eTkk57ZhZbVkU1M/view
https://www.business-humanrights.org/en/latest-news/major-brands-implicated-in-report-on-forced-labour-beyond-xinjiang/
https://uhrp.org/uaa-and-uhrp-reports
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-07-21/us-blacklists-11-companies-over-treatment-of-chinese-uyghurs/12475950
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/11/16/world/asia/china-xinjiang-documents.html
https://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/world-report/2014/01/17/china-has-no-excuse-for-its-poor-human-rights-record
www.irfroundtable.org
https://www.youthforhumanrights.org/what-are-human-rights/
https://www.humanrights.com/what-are-human-rights/universal-declaration-of-human-rights/
https://www.scientologyreligion.org/

Rev. Susan Taylor
Church of Scientology National Affairs Office
+1 202-667-6404
email us here