Uygur exiled and activists are calling on the US to boycott atrocities against the group by the Chinese Communist Party of 2022 Beijing Olympics – which he says is “on the verge of extinction.”
40-year-old Tahir Imin, who was forced to flee his home in 2017 due to an increasingly oppressive political climate – believes the boycott is key to making the CCP accountable.
“The new administration should boycott [the] Olympics, ”Imin told The Post.
He said that the sit-in of the Winter Games was a “necessary” step to prevent China’s systemic abuse of the Uygur Muslim minority in the country’s Xinjiang region.
Since 2017, the Chinese Communist Party has allegedly carried out a brutal campaign to force the ethnic group, sparking international outrage.
Experts estimate that between one and three million Uigars and other minorities are kept in internment camps, which the Chinese government calls “re-education centers”.
Former detainees, activists and news reports have described interpretive techniques including waterboarding, brainwashing and other forms of torture.
China, which denies any human rights abuses, has also been accused of forcibly sterilizing Uyghur women and mandating abortions.
Imin, an academic based in Washington DC, begged the US and other countries to take action, saying, “We are on the verge of extinction.”
“If the world international community does not take serious action, they will lose a very important element of humanity,” he warned.
In January, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken supported a determination by his Republican predecessor, Mike Pompeo, stating that China’s treatment of Uygar would lead to genocide.
“My judgment remains that the massacre was committed against the Uygars and that has not changed,” Blinken said.
Pompeo, the last day in office of former President Donald Trump, issued a fierce rebuke from Beijing stating that “we are witnessing a systematic attempt by the Chinese party-state to destroy the Uygars.”
Canada’s parliament last week passed a resolution to speed up China’s treatment for the Uyghur massacre, although Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has been reluctant to use the term.
“Any country [that] China believes that China has committed genocide, they should not do business with China, because China committed genocide against the Uyghur people, ”Imin told The Post.
His call adds to the growing pressure for the Biden administration to opt out of next year’s Olympics.
A coalition of 180 human rights and activist groups has called on governments to boycott the game against China’s alleged human rights abuses against Uyghurs, Tibetans and other minorities.
A growing number of Republican lawmakers have also joined the chorus to move games or boycott President Biden.
This will be the first time the US has gained momentum since the Carter administration boycotted the 1980 Moscow Olympics following the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan.
White House press secretary Jane Saki said Wednesday that there are currently no plans to stop American athletes from participating.
“We are not currently talking about changing our currency or our plans related to the Beijing Olympics,” Saki said during a news briefing.
The US Olympic and Paralympic Committee said it opposes the boycott “because they have been shown to negatively affect athletes while not effectively addressing global issues.”
“We believe that the more effective course of action is for the governments of the world and China to engage directly on human rights and political issues.”
A government spokesman in China rejected a global call for boycott on Wednesday, saying it was “an attempt to fail.”
While Imin admitted that it is not at all clear what, if anything, could force China to end the drastic measures, he also hoped that people would work together to oppose the regime .
“If we are truly consistent, and on our cause, we can take a number of measures, including a boycott of both the Olympics and China’s products,” Imin said.
“You don’t have to do business with China,” he said. “People are not required to use any products that add to the benefit of the Chinese Communist Party.”
With post wires
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