‘No one-size-fits-all model’: China’s top diplomat tells UN Human Rights Council
ISTANBUL (AA) – “Human rights for all” is a shared pursuit of humanity but there is “no one-size-fits-all model” in the protection of human rights, China’s top diplomat has said.
“Countries vary from one another in historical background, cultural heritage, national conditions, and needs of the people,” China’s Foreign Minister Qin Gang told the 52nd session of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC).
Addressing the session virtually, Qin said: “There is no one-size-fits-all model in the protection of human rights.”
The UNHRC session runs from February 27 to March 31 in Geneva, and Ukraine will be on the agenda.
“The right of all countries to independently choose one’s own path of human rights development should be respected. Blindly copying the model of others would be ill-fitted for one’s own conditions, and imposing one’s model upon others would entail endless troubles,” Qin said, according to a statement by China’s Foreign Ministry.
Human rights are “indivisible,” said Qin, adding the right to subsistence and the right to development “are basic human rights of primary importance.”
“Civil and political rights and economic, social and cultural rights should be accorded equal attention and advanced in a holistic way. Just as all men are born equal, all countries are equal members of the international community,” he added.
He said measures of “unilateral coercion violate” international law and the basic human rights of the people of the countries concerned, and “should be lifted immediately and unconditionally.”
China has frequently faced criticism from the international community over alleged rights excesses of Uyghurs in the country’s western Xinjiang province. The Uyghur Muslim community of Xinjiang has reportedly been subjected to various forms of abuse, torture and oppression as well as mass surveillance along with severe restrictions on freedom and liberty. The Chinese government refuses to acknowledge or be held accountable for these excesses against the Uyghur Muslims.
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