Activist and Fmr. Ambassador Discuss Uyghur Genocide

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: What do you hope this will do?

JEWHER ILHAM, UYGHUR HUMAN RIGHTS ACTIVIST: I really do hope more and more governments can recognize this — what the Chinese government is doing to that Uyghur people, it’s an act of genocide. It is a crime against humanity. There are world-recognized organizations, human rights groups, and news outlets like BBC and Mumbai’s had reported on this and had acknowledged this as crimes against humanity. But the Chinese government is still denying it. And I do hope the Chinese government can finally recognize their own mistakes and live and act on this and start changing their behaviors, release all the innocent people who are currently locked up, including my father and my cousin who is serving in prison right now.

AMANPOUR: Do you have any…

ILHAM: I really hope this report can also press — can press more, not only the governments, but also brands and corporates around the world, to put on action and stop being complicit with forced labor and human rights abuses.

AMANPOUR: Have you any contact with your own father? And I think you said your cousin. Have you any contact with them? I think they have been inside for a good eight years or more. What do you know about their condition, about their state of being right now?

ILHAM: Due to the fact that I can’t go back to China without putting myself at risk, I have not been able to visit my father in prison. And he was arrested in 2014. And the day before he was detained was the last time I spoke to him. And since 2017, family visits are no longer allowed. So, nobody from my family have — were able to visit him. And we don’t know what’s his current condition. We don’t know if he’s even alive.

AMANPOUR: Must be so awful and so worrying for you and so many families who don’t know what’s happened to their loved ones and can’t get to them. And, certainly, there’s no due process. David Scheffer, what does this report and its blatant statement of laying the blame at the foot of the state, what does it mean for governments like the United States, which has already called it genocide? What does it mean for other parliaments that are trying to get that resolution through their legislatures? What are you calling for? I mean, is it military intervention? Is that even a starter against China?

SCHEFFER: Well, that would be fairly implausible. But I must say that it is up to largely parliaments in countries around the world to take the initiative on this. The Canadian and the Dutch parliaments have done so. The British Parliament has been very focused on this issue, in other words, to at least shame the Chinese government with their own statements or determinations relating to both crimes against humanity and genocide in China.