New EU sanctions mechanism

The Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) welcomes the fact that the EU ambassadors have agreed on a sanctions mechanism for people who are involved in serious human rights violations. The planned regulation, which is based on the US Magnitsky Act, is an important first step: "With this new mechanism, European demands for the observance of human rights can finally be underpinned by sanctions. We will have to wait and see whether the EU will also give up its reluctance to criticize the Chines government, for example, or whether it will just continue to impose half-hearted travel restrictions on persons from less powerful states," stated Hanno Schedler, STP expert on genocide prevention and the Responsibility to Protect, in Göttingen today.

"The list of potential targets for individual sanctions is long," Schedler added. "In many unjust regimes, we can point out who is responsible for particularly serious human rights violations – and who is involved in them". Nonetheless, entry bans or the freezing of assets are no substitute for international criminal justice or the prosecution of war criminals. "For example, it would be appropriate to impose sanctions on the masterminds behind the ongoing genocide against the Uyghur people – even if the effect would be rather symbolic," Schedler emphasized – referring to the former Head of Security of the Xinjiang/East Turkestan region, Zhu Hailun, his successor Wang Junzheng, and Xinjiang's party secretary Chen Quanguo, who are responsible for the most serious human rights violations against the Uyghurs, Kazakhs, and Kyrgyz people in the region. The China Cables documents, which were published a year ago, had revealed that these three individuals were largely responsible for the persecution of the Muslim nationalities in China.

The agreement still has to be approved by the Council of EU Foreign Ministers. The Council will meet up again next week, on International Human Rights Day (December 10). It is expected that the ministers will approve of the agreement.