(TibetanReview.net, Dec06’22) – The House of Councillors, the Upper House of Japan’s parliament, the National Diet, has on Dec 5 adopted a resolution, condemning human rights and religious freedom violations including in Tibet, Xinjiang, Hong Kong and Inner Mongolian. China has expressed strong anger and serious protest over it, but Japanese lawmakers have followed up on that resolution by setting up a caucus to monitor human rights violations by the Communist Party of China.
While avoiding direct criticism of China, the resolution strongly urged the country’s government to fulfill accountability so the international community can understand, noted the nippon.com/en Dec 5.
The resolution mentioned “serious human rights situations” marked by violations of religious freedom and forced imprisonment in East Turkestan, Tibet, Inner Mongolia, Hong Kong and elsewhere.
The resolution was stated to note that Japan and the United States, as well as the Group of Seven members including the two, shared concern over the matter after the House of Representatives, the lower chamber, adopted a similar resolution in February.
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The resolution ignores basic facts and contains nothing but disinformation and interferes in China’s internal affairs and China has made serious démarches with the Japanese side, China’s official globaltimes.cn Dec 5 cited Mao Ning, spokesperson of China’s Foreign Ministry, as saying at a press briefing.
Politicizing and instrumentalizing human rights issues to hurt China’s image and stall China’s development will not succeed, Mao has maintained.
The report also said a spokesperson of the Chinese Embassy in Japan had expressed strong dissatisfaction with and firm opposition to the resolution in a speech he delivered on Dec 5. He has alleged that such criticisms are a “malicious interference in other countries’ internal affairs” and a serious violation of “international law and basic norms in international relations.”
The globaltimes.cn report maintained that “Xinjiang, Tibet and Hong Kong are purely China’s internal affairs where there exist no human rights problems at all”. It added that “any external force has no right to interfere or make comments”.
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Meanwhile, Japanese lawmakers have followed up on their expression of grave concern over the “human rights issues” in Xinjiang, Tibet, Inner Mongolia and Hong Kong by launching on the same day a caucus of parliamentarians to monitor human rights violations by the Chinese communist party. Keiji Furuya and Hiromi Mitsuybayashi of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) were elected Chairman and General Secretary of the caucus. And Yoshiko Sakurai of the Japan Institute for National Fundamentals, a Think Tank, was appointed advisor to the caucus.
Also at the launch of the caucus event, lawmaker Keiji Furuya, Minister Takaichi Sanae, Shimomura Hakubun, and Think Tank Director Yoshiko Sakurai spoke on how international communities’ continued silence has emboldened China to commit atrocities on its people and the people of the occupied regions with impunity, reported the Tibet.net website of the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) Dec 6.
They were also stated to have commented that time had come for them to safeguard international norms and speak against Chinese hegemonic and aggressive provocations.
Hakubun, Chairman of the Japan Parliamentary Support Group for Tibet, has welcomed the formation of the caucus. He has spoken on the cultural genocide happening in Tibet and the peaceful approach adopted by His Holiness the Dalai Lama and the CTA to resolve the Sino-Tibet conflict.
Among the invited speakers at the event were stated to be former Sikyong Dr Lobang Sangay of the CTA, Dolkun Isa of the World Uyghur Congress; Prof Ohno Akira of Shizuoka University; and Daichin Olhunud of the Southern Mongolia Congress.