As described by survivors to BBC News just this month, there is “an organized system of mass rape, sexual abuse and torture,” and “their goal is to destroy everyone.”
It is true that not all atrocities amount to genocide. However, the atrocities occurring in Xinjiang have already been found, by multiple, credible bodies, to constitute genocide.
In October 2020, following multiple hearings on the subject, the Canadian Subcommittee on International Human Rights was “persuaded that the actions of the Chinese Communist Party constitute genocide as laid out in the Genocide Convention.” The Subcommittee then explicitly called on the Government of Canada to “recognize the acts being committed in Xinjiang against Uyghurs (as constituting) genocide.”
Reputable Canadian non-profit organizations immediately echoed these statements. In November 2020, Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center (FSWC) and the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights (RWCHR) called on the Government of Canada to implement the Subcommittee’s recommendations and recognize the atrocities as constituting genocide.
RWCHR Chair and former Minister of Justice Irwin Cotler stated that “the mass atrocities targeting the Uyghurs constitute acts of genocide under the Genocide Convention” and urged “the Canadian Parliament (to) make (this) determination.”
So what is missing, from Trudeau’s perspective, in terms of “facts and evidence”? Why the delay in making this recommended determination? If the report of the subcommittee left questions unanswered, why not refer the matter to the Supreme Court of Canada for an advisory opinion, as Cotler suggested yesterday? As he put it, it is urgent and compelling.
As atrocities continue in Xinjiang, political inaction becomes increasingly unacceptable. Real people are suffering; an entire population is being destroyed.
Canada and other rights-respecting democracies need to step up, take concrete action to combat these crimes, and ensure that the words ‘never again’ mean something. This starts with calling it what it is: a genocide.
Sarah Teich is an international human rights lawyer, a senior fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute, and a legal advisor to the Canadian Security Research Group.
Canada and other rights-respecting democracies need to step up, take concrete action to combat these crimes, and ensure that the words ‘never again’ mean something. This starts with calling it what it is: a genocide, writes Sarah Teich in the Toronto Sun. 
