Canada has sanctioned eight senior Chinese officials for “grave human rights violations” against Falun Gong practitioners, Tibetans, and Uyghurs.
“Canada is deeply concerned by the human rights violations in Xinjiang and Tibet and against those who practise Falun Gong,” Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly said in a
Dec. 10 press release.
“We call on the Chinese government to put an end to this systematic campaign of repression and uphold its international human rights obligations.”
In the statement, Global Affairs Canada said the ethnic and religious groups have faced severe mistreatment, including forced labour and torture, and restrictions on fundamental freedoms.
Global Affairs expressed concern about the human rights abuses against Tibetans as well as ethnic minorities in the Xinjiang region, where it said over one million people have been “arbitrarily detained” since 2017.
The department also noted that since 1999, Beijing has tried to “eliminate Falun Gong” in China through “arbitrary arrests, forced labour and torture.”
Canada
sanctioned four Chinese officials in
2021 for human rights abuses against the Uyghur minority group in Xinjiang. Global Affairs said the latest round of sanctions coincides with International Human Rights Day on Dec. 10.
In a separate
press release, the government named Chen Quanguo, Tuniyaz Erkin, Zakir Shohrat, Peng Jiarui, Wu Yingjie, Liujun Huo, Zhang Hongbo, and You Quan as individuals targeted for sanctions under the
Special Economic Measures (People’s Republic of China) Regulations. These regulations bar Canadian individuals and businesses from transactions with the sanctioned persons, including freezing assets in Canada, blocking access to financial services, and prohibiting property-related dealings.
On the same day as Ottawa’s announcement, Wu, the Communist Party Secretary of Tibet—the highest-ranking position in the region—was expelled from the Party and removed from office. He is
under investigation for bribery.
During his tenure, Wu participated in at least two cases of persecution against local Falun Gong practitioners, according to Minghui.org, a website dedicated to the documentation of the persecution campaign against Falun Gong by the Chinese regime.
Falun Gong is a spiritual discipline based on the principles of truthfulness, compassion, and tolerance. The practice rose to popularity in China in the early 1990s, with an estimated 70 million to 100 million people practising across the country at the time. The faith, which includes a set of meditative exercises, is rooted in traditional Chinese culture and does not align with communist ideology.
In 1999, the CCP launched a nationwide persecution when it perceived Falun Gong as a threat to the Party’s control of the Chinese populace. The CCP’s ongoing persecution in China persists, with reports of torture, forced labour, physical and sexual abuse, and even live organ harvesting.
The efforts to target Falun Gong have also extended far beyond China’s boundaries. According to whistleblowers, in a secret meeting in 2022, current CCP leader Xi Jinping ordered
intensified efforts against practitioners overseas, including using lawfare and disinformation campaigns to attack Falun Gong internationally. Xi’s directive at the meeting only recently came to light.
US Sanctions
The U.S. government had already sanctioned several of the eight individuals named in Ottawa’s latest announcement.
In 2022, the U.S. Treasury Department
sanctioned Wu for enforcing the CCP’s “stability policies” aimed at exerting control over Tibetan minorities. These policies involved extrajudicial killings, mass detention, physical abuse, and forced sterilizations and abortions.
Zhang, the former director of the Tibetan Public Security Bureau, was also sanctioned at the same time for his role in running detention centres in Tibet that enforced the policies.
Huo, the former Party Secretary of the Xinjing Public Security Bureau, was sanctioned in 2020. He was involved in the CCP’s surveillance and mass detention of Uyghur Muslims in the province, according to the
U.S. Treasury Department.
Peng, who served as commander of Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps—a state-enterprise and paramilitary organization involved in the use of forced labour—was also
sanctioned. Chen Quanguo, former Communist Party Secretary of the Xinjiang region, was also sanctioned.
Joly
travelled to China in July, and said she raised human rights concerns with her Chinese counterpart at the time.
