A top UN human rights official is facing calls to resign after her visit to Xinjiang ended with her repeating, rather than denouncing, Chinese government propaganda about the ongoing genocide there.
Human rights advocates and Uyghur activists were stunned and swiftly condemned Bachelet's actions.
"If the one institution that was supposed to stand by us ended up aiding the Chinese government’s own narrative, what more could we do to change the victims’ lives?" said Rayhan Asat, a human rights lawyer and Yale law fellow whose brother is detained in Xinjiang, calling this the "ultimate betrayal."
The institution of the High Commissioner for Human Rights is now "badly compromised," said Frederick John Packer, a professor of law at the University of Ottawa who served on the drafting committee secretariat at the 1993 World Conference on Human Rights, where the plan to establish the post of High Commissioner for Human Rights was"The world cannot afford this," he said. "She must resign along with those who advised this awful course.
On May 20, a group of 40 legislators from 18 countries, including the U.S., Germany, France, Lithuania, New Zealand and Japan,that Chinese authorities planned a "Potemkin-style tour" and criticized Bachelet for going through with the visit without securing promises of unrestricted access. "The UN should never undertake any of these trips unless it is under conditions that they specify, and not conditions that are dictated to them," Ibrahim said.Back in December, Bachelet's office promised to soon release a report on conditions in Xinjiang. That report has yet to be released.