UN Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities

Fifty - first session

Agenda item 10

Freedom of movement

Oral statement by the Transnational Radical Party, a non-governmental organisation in general consultative status

Geneva, 20 August 1999

Delivered by Olga Cechurova

Mr. Chairman,

The Transnational Radical Party would like to express its appreciation of the Sub-Commission's continuing attention to the problems of population transfer, which, as broadly recognised and affirmed, affect the basic human rights of inhabitants and settlers. We would like to draw your attention to the issue of the population displacements in the autonomous regions of the People's Republic of China: in Tibet, Eastern Turkestan and Inner Mongolia. Since the military annexation of these countries by China in the late 1940's (Inner Mongolia in 1947, Eastern Turkestan and Tibet in 1949), the peoples of these regions face continuous massive and government sponsored population transfers of ethnic Chinese, and suffer serious violations of their human rights and political rights.

As a result of the 50 years lasting massive populations transfers and severe birth control policy of the People's Republic of China, the Tibetans, Uighurs and Mongols are faced with concrete danger of becoming a small minority in their own homelands. The ever-growing Chinese population has brought unemployment, hunger and poverty to these peoples. Around 90 per cent of positions in public life are occupied by Chinese. The average yearly income of the Uighurs, Tibetans and Mongols amount to about 1/4 to 1/3 of the income of Chinese settlers. Virgin forests have been chopped down to house exclusively Chinese settlers, but thousand of Tibetans, Uighurs and Mongols are still without a shelter. The lack of proper medical treatment results in that almost 70 per cent of illnesses are fatal. Eighty per cent of the children grow up with the poor sanitation; this results that the death-case ratio is the highest in China.

Moreover, to restrain their population, tens of thousands of Uighur, Mongol and Tibetan women are being forced to undergo abortion and sterilization. This birth control system has lead to the death of thousands of women and children throughout these regions. Contrary to "one child" policy in China, Chinese settlers in Tibet, East Turkestan and Inner Mongolia are allowedto have more children.

This population policy, accompanied with other serious violations of human rights towards Tibetans, Uighurs and Mongols, threatens to end with complete disappearance, or dissolution, of these peoples.

In April 1999, the World Bank revealed that it intended to fund the China Western Poverty Reduction Project, which included the resettlement of about 60.000 Chinese into Amdo Province of Tibet (now incorporated into Qinghai Province). Substantial opposition has been raised to the project on human rights and environmental grounds, and the World Bank's Executive Board postponed the decision after the conclusions of the investigation on the matter will be known. According to Washington Post of yesterday, Chinese

security agents have detained 3 days ago and American who was inspecting the project in northwestern China and accused him of engaging in an "illegal investigation". In this way, China demonstrates, besides its good will and respect of human rights, the real aim of the project. The Tibetan concerns are that the project is planned without local participation, will reduce the already dwindling Tibetans and Mongolians into impoverished

minorities and the project will have a huge adverse impact on the region's fragile eco-system. We would also like to underline that the proposed project in Tibet goes against the World Bank's own regulations which state that the bank won't finance any project which goes to undermine the cultural integrity of a minority people.

The Transnational Radical Party is convinced that any funding, co-operation agreements or multilateral assistance to the People's Republic of China, besides respecting the well-being of the peoples concerned, must be conditioned on human rights improvements.

The Transnational Radical Party urges this session of the Sub-Commission to strongly pronounce itself against the above-mentioned policy of the People's Republic of China and to seriously review the situation of China's autonomous regions since its adoption of the resolution on Tibet 1991/10 on

23 August 1991. We also encourage the Sub-Commission to support the appointment of a Special Rapporteur to investigate the human rights situation in Tibet, Eastern Turkestan and Inner Mongolia.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.