China Wins High-Stakes U.N. Vote on Its Xinjiang Atrocities

The U.N. Human Rights Council blocked a debate on the Chinese Communist Party’s genocide and crimes against humanity in Xinjiang following an intensive diplomatic campaign by Beijing’s diplomats at the U.N. in Geneva.

A U.S.-led resolution that called for a debate on the Chinese government campaign against Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities received only 17 votes in favor, while 19 countries opposed the measure. Meanwhile, eleven countries abstained from voting on the question.

Washington and its allies believed that political momentum was on their side following the recent release of a report by the U.N.’s top human-rights official finding that Beijing might be carrying out crimes against humanity in Xinjiang. But Beijing initiated a full-court press to lobby against any measures intended to punish, or even scrutinize, China at the human-rights body.

A delegation of Party officials from Xinjiang visited Geneva last month to give a two-hour press conference in which they strenuously denied the well-documented charges that Beijing is working systematically to detain, abuse, and torture the region’s minorities.

And, in the end, China could count on some of its most reliable allies to carry water for its propaganda. During the debate that preceded the vote, Cuba and Venezuela, in addition to others, provided cover for Beijing’s position. Meanwhile, abstaining countries, such as Mexico, argued that a Human Rights Council debate is not the best way to address the issue.

In one sense, today’s vote indicates a certain degree of progress, given the U.N. system’s abject failure to address Chinese human-rights abuses.

Calling the vote “an abdication of responsibility and a betrayal of Uyghur victims,” Human Rights Watch’s Sophie Richardson pointed out that “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.”

Yet Washington was unable to persuade some of the countries with which the U.S. is closely aligned on many other issues. Ukraine abstained, apparently hedging its bets in the hope that Beijing will pressure Moscow to end its invasion. India also abstained, despite its alignment with the U.S. on China’s malign influence in the Indo-Pacific.

“No country represented here today has a perfect human-rights record,” said Michele Taylor, Washington’s ambassador to the council. “No country, no matter how powerful, should be excluded from Council discussions — this includes my country, the United States, and it includes the People’s Republic of China.”

Functionally speaking, China has been excluded from meaningful scrutiny at the Human Rights Council, while U.S. adversaries have succeeded into disproportionately scrutinizing its actions, in addition to those of Israel.

When the Biden administration opted to bring the U.S. back to the Council last year, reversing Washington’s Trump-era withdrawal from the body, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that it is “in need of reform to its agenda, membership, and focus, including its disproportionate focus on Israel,” but that “the United States must be at the table using the full weight of our diplomatic leadership.”

In the year and a half since, the administration has secured some notable wins, such as Russia’s expulsion from the body. Yet the fact that Russia was allowed to join, and that China remains a member in good standing with a level of influence which exceeds the U.S. speaks to the fundamental structural problems that have turned the body into a haven for dictatorships.

Each time the council votes to shield Beijing from scrutiny from its atrocities, the U.S. may object, condemn, and lament. But its continued membership in the body says that it considers the Council’s proceedings to be legitimate, even where it may disagree with the outcomes.

Blinken said last year that “the best way to improve the Council is to engage with it and its members in a principled fashion.” Nearly two years into Washington’s reengagement with the Council, that principled engagement is delivering principled diplomatic defeat.