“Help China’s Uyghur Muslims” – Jewish human rights charity asks MPs to support ‘Genocide Amendment’ to Trade Bill

Sunday 7 February, 2021As the Trade Bill returns to House of Commons on Tuesday, Mia Hasenson-Gross, Executive Director of the Jewish human rights charity, René Cassin, is making the following plea to MPs:

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The founder of modern conservatism, Edmund Burke, is attributed as saying:

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing”.

There can be few evils greater than that being inflicted on the Uyghur people by the Chinese Communist Party. Last month, the Foreign Secretary told MPs “we have a moral duty to respond”, having itemised the regime’s horrific barbarism: “Internment camps, arbitrary detention, political re-education, forced labour, torture and forced sterilisation. All on an industrial scale”.

I make a simple plea to those same MPs. Remember the words of Edmund Burke.

Please do something.Do something that will enhance the UK’s reputation as a force for good in the worldDo something that will deter tyrants and defeat evilDo something that will help the Uyghur people who are today being crushed by the inhuman cruelty of the Chinese Communist PartyI ask in the name of René Cassin, the French-Jewish co-author of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The Declaration was the world’s response to the atrocities of Nazism when, in its words, “… disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind”.

When these words are echoed by those of the Foreign Secretary only last month, I fear that “Never Again!” is becoming “yet again”.

Please support the ‘Genocide Amendment’.

Thank you.

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For further information or comment, please contact Mia Hasenson-Gross:

Email: mia.hasenson-gross@renecassin.org

Mobile: 07939 130 286

NotesTrade Bill ‘Genocide Amendment’ – the House of Lords approved a new version of the amendment on 2 February by a majority of 171 (359 v 188) after an earlier version was narrowly defeated in the House of Commons (the Government’s working majority of 87 being cut to just 11, meaning the new amendment will pass if only six further MPs support it)
Foreign Secretary, Dominic Raab’s House of Commons statement, 12 January 2021: https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/foreign-secretary-on-the-situation-in-xinjiang-and-the-governments-response

Includes the following quote:

“Internment camps, arbitrary detention, political re-education, forced labour, torture and forced sterilisation. All on an industrial scale. It is truly horrific. Barbarism we had hoped lost to another era, being practised today, as we speak, in one of the leading members of the international community. Mr Speaker, we have a moral duty to respond.”
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted by the UN General Assembly on 10 December 1948 https://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/

René Cassin is a charity working to promote and protect universal human rights, drawing on Jewish experience and values. The organisation is named after the French-Jewish co-author of the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Registered charity number: 1117472. For more information visit: www.renecassin.org

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