Fascist China

[EACLucifer]

otoh, if she's trying to negotiate an improvement in China's behaviour, ragging them off in a press conference wouldn't exactly be designed to help negotiations.

You do not go to a country engaging in genocide, praise them on human rights, and duck the issue while happily engaging with their propaganda apparatus. It really is that simple, especially when people from the ethnic minority that is subject to imprisonment in concentration camps, forced sterilisation etc is telling you not to go. The UN is hopeless, absolutely hopeless. They were supposed to be releasing a report on "Xinjiang" last year. It still hasn't emerged. Nor is she the only sernior figure atr the UN to suck up to China - Alena Douhan did a propaganda event for them titled "Xinjiang is a Wonderful Land", for which she received a couple of hundred grand, as well as also being on the take from Russia and Qatar.

They've also got Iran on the Commission on the Status of Women, and North Korea are taking over non-proliferation.

The idea of the UN wasn't a bad one, but the reality is an organisation largely hijacked by dictators.

[Al Capone Junior]

Powerful and Continuing Nationalism
Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights
Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause
Supremacy of the Military
Rampant Sexism
Controlled Mass Media
Obsession with National Security
Religion and Government are Intertwined
Corporate Power is Protected
Labor Power is Suppressed
Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts
Rampant Cronyism and Corruption
Fraudulent Elections

The US has almost all of these right now in spades. So let's call a spade a spade.

[EACLucifer]

Powerful and Continuing Nationalism
Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights
Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause
Supremacy of the Military
Rampant Sexism
Controlled Mass Media
Obsession with National Security
Religion and Government are Intertwined
Corporate Power is Protected
Labor Power is Suppressed
Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts
Rampant Cronyism and Corruption
Fraudulent Elections

The US has almost all of these right now in spades. So let's call a spade a spade.

There's a lot wrong with the US, but do go and read the report on China's conduct Cardinal Fang and I linked. Not only are a number of those listed as detained without any reason whatsoever, but the incarceration rate in "Xinjiang" is many, many times that of the worst US state, and is coupled with policies to prevent Uighur births and very deliberately destroy Uighur culture.

It doesn't stop you acknowleding problems with the USA - or the UK or any other country - to acknowledge that China's behaviour here is a lot worse than anything the US is doing right now, especially as the USA does not in fact meet all of the criteria listed above, whereas China pretty much does.

[Al Capone Junior]

I get it, point taken. But we're trying our best to catch up. At least some of us are.

[shpalman]

Hong Kong police have warned that people risk breaking the law if they gather on Saturday to commemorate China’s Tiananmen crackdown

Discussion of the 4 June 1989 crackdown, when the Chinese government set troops and tanks on peaceful protesters, is forbidden in mainland China. For decades Hong Kong exercised its semi-autonomy and freedom of speech to hold an annual candlelit memorial for the victims. But after the national security law was brought in in 2020, that came to an end.

Liauw also said any person who promoted an unauthorised assembly in Victoria Park, even if they themselves did not show up, will have contravened the law.

Asked if residents can wear black clothes, bring flowers or candles and appear near the park at all, he said: “If that person makes us feel that his or her purpose of appearance is to incite others, we of course will search for evidence.”

Since the security law came into force in 2020, a drive to remove all trace of Tiananmen has swept through the city.

Dozens of lawmakers and activists – including many connected to the vigil – are in jail. The Hong Kong Alliance, the most prominent Tiananmen advocacy group and the vigil organiser, was prosecuted as a “foreign agent” over incitement to subversion. Last September its leaders were arrested, their museum closed after a police raid, and digital records deleted overnight.

Last December Hong Kong University removed its “Pillar of Shame,” a sculpture commemorating the victims of the massacre and which had stood on the site for two decades.

The crackdown has cast a chilling shadow across the remaining pro-democracy advocates, as well as media, the arts, and the legal profession. Many have been targeted by pro-Beijing newspapers, published on lists of accused subversives, while human rights lawyers have been cast as suspicious for representing clients.