The U.N.’s high commissioner for human rights claimed that a sweeping redistribution of wealth across the globe is a critical human-rights cause.
The U.N. co-hosted a human-rights conference in China with the country’s ministry of foreign affairs on Monday. The international organization’s human-rights chief endorsed a sweeping reorientation of the global economy around broadly left-wing economic concepts and declined to press Beijing on its widespread human-rights abuses.
The conference took place in Hangzhou, a city in China’s coastal Zhejiang province, as part of an international U.N. dialogue series on “economic, social, and cultural rights.” The dialogue takes place in different locations, with this session following a week-long junket visit to the country by representatives from Beijing-aligned governments.
Volker Turk, the U.N.’s high commissioner for human rights, delivered pre-recorded remarks to the event, thanking the Chinese government for hosting it. His message steered clear of human-rights topics as they are conventionally understood in Western countries but claimed that a sweeping redistribution of wealth across the globe is a critical human-rights cause. “The pursuit of economic growth at all costs has contributed to the denial of human rights and the destruction of our climate and our environment,” he said.
Turk endorsed the concept of a “right to development,” a concept pushed by China and like-minded dictatorships to cast Western sanctions as an illegitimate violation of human rights. He said countries must “redesign the global tax architecture to make it fairer and more inclusive.”
Turk notably did not make any criticism of China’s record on human rights, despite calling on Beijing earlier this year to end “laws, policies and practices that violate fundamental rights, including in the Xinjiang and Tibet regions.” He was referring to the Chinese Communist Party’s widespread atrocities against minorities in those two regions. The U.S. government has referred to Chinese actions in Xinjiang as crimes against humanity and genocide.
Turk’s predecessor, Michelle Bachelet, slow-walked a long-awaited report on the situation in Xinjiang in 2022. She opted to release it as her term was just hours away from expiring. The report found that China’s policies against Uyghurs “may constitute international crimes, in particular crimes against humanity.”
Turk also did not bring up the Chinese regime’s crackdown in Hong Kong, including recent conviction of 45 pro-democracy leaders on charges related to their political activities. The trial of pro-democracy figure and newspaper owner Jimmy Lai is ongoing. Turk’s office has previously expressed concern about the situation in conversations with the Chinese government.
Close to 50 countries were represented at the conference, including Beijing-aligned autocracies such as Eritrea.
Top Chinese Communist Party diplomat Wang Yi delivered a written message to the dialogue: “Historic achievements have been made in China’s human rights cause,” the message stated.
Shen Bo, the director-general of the foreign ministry’s department of international organizations and conferences, attended the conference and touted China’s human-rights record, according to the Chinese government’s summary of the dialogue.
Academics affiliated with a Chinese government-run academic institution promoted Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative as an important contributions to global development, according to China.org, a website operated by the Chinese Communist Party’s propaganda department.
U.N. secretary general Antonio Guterres has endorsed the BRI, which has been integrated into U.N.-run development initiatives, and spoken at conferences in Beijing focused on the controversial program.