UIGHUR TRIBUNAL HEARS CHARGES OF CHINESE ABUSES; BEIJING LABELS IT ‘CLUMSY PR SHOW’

LONDON: A London panel investigating the plight of Uighurs in China on Friday heard witness testimony of torture and gang rapes, in a process slammed by Beijing as a mendacious smear.

One witness described squalid conditions and brutality in camps in the northwestern Chinese region of Xinjiang, and said one woman had died after undergoing forced sterilisation.

The nine Uk-based jurors of the “Uighur Tribunal”, including lawyers and human rights experts, convened the first of two evidence sessions and intend to publish a report in December on whether China is guilty of genocide.

“Allegations made against the PRC (People’s Republic of China) are grave,” tribunal chair Geoffrey Nice said at the opening of the first four-day session.

The body is not affiliated with any government, and China has refused to participate, branding it a “machine producing lies”.

“It is not even a real tribunal or special court, but only a special machine producing lies,” foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said last week.

“It was founded by people with ulterior motives and carries no weight or authority. It is just a clumsy public opinion show under the guise of law,” he told reporters.