Experts, including two former diplomats representing America at the United Nations, warned Congress in a reading on Wednesday that China is getting power within the U. N. framework to “blunt criticism, shut up and vilify Taiwan, plug its Belt and Road Initiative, and deplete norms that might be used to keep it responsible”.
The experts cited examples of the Chinese Communist Party actively seeking leadership positions for members of the regime at the highest levels of influence in U.N. organizations, funding obscure U.N. projects and stealing them from Beijing’s interests, and using its Belt and Road Initiative ( BRI ) to coerce poor nations into defending it from human rights criticism at the UN.
China’s” Universal Periodic Review” at the Human Rights Council this season was one of the most notable instances of the latter. China was one of the 14 nations under investigation in 2024 when the Human Rights Council reviewed the data of various administrations on a deadline. The lot dictatorships now hold the office.
The Chinese Communist Party, which is one of the most brutal and famous human rights criminals in the world, most famously for its role in the ongoing genocide against Turkic ethnic groups in dominated East Turkistan, received lavish praise from the Human Rights Council  for” devotion to the promotion of humanity’s popular values,” “improvement of the legal litigation system,” and “impressive progress in the field of social socioeconomic development. Among the countries applauding the communists were fellow rogue states such as Russia and Iran, but nominal U. S. allies including Ukraine, a BRI member, as well.
The experts also lamented China’s role in restricting W. H. O.’s ability to act competently in the wake of the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic and other similar attempts to influence other U. N. bodies.
The hearing was held on Wednesday by the Congressional Subcommittee on Global Health, Global Human Rights, and International Organizations under the heading” The Chinese Communist Party’s Malign Influence at the United Nations — It’s Getting Worse.” The Congressional-Executive Commission on China, a bicameral body, held a similar event in February that focused solely on the Universal Periodic Review. Rep. Chris Smith ( R- NJ) chaired both events.
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On Wednesday, Smith lamented the “ever- worsening, pervasive malign influence of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP ) at the United Nations”.
Rep. Smith argued that the CCP is not a benign rival of the United States or other free nations but does pose a serious military threat to the United States and an existential threat to its neighbors in the area. Through its involvement at the UN, the CCP has “mastered the art of subverting international rules-based order” under Xi Jinping. And I’m deeply concerned that the Biden Administration is n’t putting enough pressure on to stop it.
He noted that the subversion comes from pressure on” Chinese nationals in leadership positions to give Party interests precedence over their duty to the UN charter.”
” When Wu Hongbo was head of the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, he admitted to acting in China’s interest at the UN — including throwing Xinjiang]East Turkistan ] human rights supporters out of UN buildings”, he recalled. ” And when Chinese nationals attempt to lead Interpol without executing Xi Jinping’s orders, they are immediately punished,” as in the case of Meng Hongwei, the first Chinese leader.
Hongwei disappeared in 2018, after , shortly after canceling a “red notice”, or request for arrest, against the head of the World Uyghur Congress, and resurfaced in Chinese prison two years later, sentenced to serve 13 years for alleged corruption.
Smith also brought up the pressure Chinese officials placed on Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus’s head, and Beijing’s disregard for repeated requests for information from Wuhan about the spread of a novel coronavirus, which ultimately claimed the lives of millions of people worldwide.
Addressing the hearing,  , Suzanne Nossel, the head of the free speech organization PEN America, accused China of engaging in” a , concerted effort to secure executive leadership posts across the UN”.
Nossel noted that the PRC held the lead in four of the body’s 15 specialized agencies from 2020 to 2022, a stark contrast to the previous two decades, when it was China holding the lowest number of UN executive positions among both permanent and aspiring Security Council members.
Nossel also made note of the link between China’s leverage at the UN and the BRI, a global infrastructure initiative that China allegedly offers predatory loans to developing nations in an effort to pay for infrastructure projects. When the countries cannot pay the loans, China uses its influence to impose its agenda, seize property, or demand political favors.
Nossel cited the Human Rights Council’s assessment of China as “many of the countries are deeply indebted on BRI projects and were reportedly threatened by Beijing in advance of the hearing.”
Former American Ambassador to the UN and former head of the Economic and Social Council Kelley Currie spoke out about the growing Chinese communist influence that the country is experiencing in its operations, noting that it goes beyond elbowing into positions of power and strong-arming weaker nations into attempts to rewrite much of the country’s philosophical framework through the use of communist propaganda jargon in critical international law.
” Xi Jinping Thought has become enshrined in the international lexicon”, Currie denounced.” ‘ Win-Win Cooperation on Human Rights is now a permanent forum for China’s violation of human rights from within the UN system. And UN officials continue to parrot” shared future” and other convoluted phrases, either purposefully or ignorantly spreading these offensive words.
The changing of language within the U. N. system, she explained, serve to promote a “funhouse mirror vision of human rights” crafted to amass power on the international stage for dictator Xi Jinping.
Currie brought up a disturbing incident where a Chinese diplomat directly retaliated against Antonio Guterres, the U.N. secretary-general.
Chinese diplomats have been accused of harassing civil society representatives inside the UN, including by preventing them from speaking at UN conferences. The Chinese ambassador reportedly was reportedly heard screaming threats at Guterres over the phone during one incident involving Dolkan Isa, the head of the World Uyghur Congress, demanding that he stop Isa from entering the UN.
China has n’t experienced any significant decline in access or influence at the UN as a result of this transgressive behavior. Rather, China’s leverage and influence keeps growing.
Andrew Bremberg, the former U.S. ambassador to Geneva and the president emeritus of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, claimed similarly that Chinese officials had “actively sought to place Chinese nationals in important positions within the UN system, including specialized agencies, to quietly change the status quo.” After falling into the BRI “debt traps,” Bremberg noticed how the BRI had an effect on other states ‘ behavior, who were suddenly showing signs of “backing for China’s positions on contentious issues or in elections for UN bodies.”
Bremberg also pointed out that the U.N. Human Rights Council has ignored important evidence that China is engaging in genocide and other crimes against humanity, particularly a 2022 report by the Victims of Communism Foundation known as the , Xinjiang Police Files, which contained leaked police information, Communist Party speeches calling for genocide, and the names and identities of thousands of Uyghur prisoners who were forced into China’s Uyghur concentration camps, including photos and
Bremberg told Congress,” It is shameful that this report has never been discussed at a meeting of the UN HRC [ Human Rights Council ]”. This was attempted by the United States at its 51st session in October 2022, but it was defeated by two votes. The fact that the United States has made no attempt to put this report on any agenda makes it even more humbling.
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