New Delhi: India on Thursday abstained on a West-led draft resolution at the UN Human Rights Council which sought to hold a debate on the human rights situation in China’s Xinjiang region.The resolution – on “holding a debate on the situation of human rights in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China” – was rejected by a slim majority following intense Chinese lobbying.In a show of Beijing’s diplomatic clout, only 17 of the Council’s 47 members voted in favour, 19 voted against, including China, and there were 11 abstentions.#HRC51 | Draft resolution A/HRC/51/L.6 on holding a debate on the situation of human rights in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of #China, was REJECTED. pic.twitter.com/ITbWnqQaKe— UN Human Rights Council 📍 #HRC51 (@UN_HRC) October 6, 2022The draft resolution was presented by a core group consisting of Canada, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, the UK and the US, and co-sponsored by a range of states, including Turkey.India did not give an explanation for its vote. Along with India, the abstention bench included Argentina, Armenia, Benin, Brazil, Gambia, Libya, Malawi, Malaysia, Mexico and Ukraine.Among the 17 OIC members on the Council, twelve voted against the resolution, four countries abstained and only one – Somalia – voted in favour. Among them, the unexpected votes, according to diplomatic observers, were from Indonesia and Qatar, both toed the Chinese line by going against the resolution.All the African members, except Somalia, followed China’s call for voting ‘no’.The majority of the thirteen Asian nations also went towards the Chinese camp. Eight voted against the resolution, while only India and Malaysia abstained. The three Asian countries that voted ‘yes’ were Japan, South Korea and the Marshall islands.In South Asia, India abstained, but Nepal and Pakistan voted against the resolution. The text had called for a debate on the situation in Xinjiang at the next session of the UNHRC in March 2023, as a follow-up to the report of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner of Human Rights (OHCHR) published on August 31.Released just minutes before the end of the term of Michelle Bachelet, the report said that the “extent of arbitrary and discriminatory detention of members of Uyghur and other predominantly Muslim groups … may constitute international crimes, in particular crimes against humanity.”In an answer to a query at a weekly briefing last month, India’s ministry of external affairs spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said, “Our understanding is that the report is about the serious maltreatment of minorities in Xinjiang. But this is a UNHRC report, so for the moment, let the UN comment on it.”He repeated twice that the report was about the “serious maltreatment” of minorities in China. “I don’t have anything to say further… except to note that it is about the serious maltreatment of minorities.”According to media reports, China had asked Bachelet to bury the report. Bachelet confirmed that she had received a letter from about 40 other states, adding that her office would not respond to such pressure.After she visited China in May, Bachelet faced severe criticism from human rights groups for being too soft on the Asian giant. The former Chilean president has since stated that she will refrain from seeking a second term for personal reasons.Human rights groups have been sounding the alarm over what is happening in the resource-rich north-western Chinese province for years, alleging that more than one million Uyghurs had been detained against their will in a large network of what Beijing calls “re-education camps”.Rejecting the resolution, Chinese ambassador Chen Xu claimed that China never gave its support to the OHCHR report, and warned of a bad precedent. “Today, China is targeted,” Chen said. “Tomorrow, any other developing country could be targeted.After the vote, a Western diplomat told the Associated Press that it was “always difficult for countries to vote against a permanent member of the Security Council. He acknowledged it was a “genuinely difficult call” for some countries – notably those with economic or political ties to China – to sign on to the measure.China director at Human Rights Watch, Sophie Richardson, said in a statement that for the first time in its history, the UN’s top human rights body considered a proposal to debate the human rights situation in the Xinjiang region of China.“While the Council’s failure to adopt the proposal is an abdication of responsibility and a betrayal of Uyghur victims, the extremely close vote highlights the growing number of states willing to take a stand on principle and shine a spotlight on China’s sweeping rights violations,” Richardson said.(With agency inputs)Note: This article has been updated since publication with additional details.
