ISLAMABAD: Members of the parliament said the US “propaganda” against Beijing on Xinjiang, an autonomous territory in northwest China, is groundless.
The US accuses China of detaining more than one million Uyghurs, a Turkic ethnic group recognised as native to the Xinjiang region, against their will over the past few years in a large network of so-called re-education camps.
China denies the allegations and says its system of “re-education” camps are there to combat separatism and militancy.
Speaking at a webinar held by the Islamabad-based think-tank Pakistan-China Institute, Minister for Human Rights Shireen Mazari said the United States is desperately forming military alliances to undermine China on one hand, and on the other hand, it is leveling baseless allegations against China.
“When the US is seeking a new Cold War, the militarisation of global politics and global economics, China has a totally different way of approaching the world […] through shared economic prosperity, opening up the world through trade routes, and building up infrastructure in African countries and in Pakistan among others, so that everybody can achieve greater prosperity through greater cooperation, through international trade,” said the minister.
The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) proposed by China aims to promote economic prosperity for all, she added.
Senator Mushahid Hussain Syed, who also chairs the Defense Committee of the Upper House, said at the event that the false allegations on Xinjiang are a part of the US propaganda to counter China.
“Pakistan will continue to support China on its core national interests,” he added.
