THE EROPEAN PARLIAMENT HAS APPROVED A RESOLUTION ON THE HUMAN RIGHTS SITUATION IN ESTERN TURKESTAN.

Strasbourg, April 10, 1997 - Under the initiative of Mr. Olivier DUPUIS, Mr. Gianfranco DELL'ALBA and Mr. Jean-François HORY, from the Radical group at the EP, and Mr. Karl HABSBURG LOTHRINGEN, from the European People Party, the European Parliament has approved, for the first time, a resolution that condemns the human rights situation in Eastern Turkenstan. The resolution "deploring the fact that the European Union has not a reached a common position on China this year at the Human Rights Commission in Geneva" condemns in particular the use of the death penalty without discrimination, the massive movement of Chinese people into Turkestan, "the demographic control, through a policy of births modifying the ethnic composition of this region" and "the policy of the People's Republic of China in eliminating the culture of the Oigour people and in repressing their Islamic religious belief". The resolution also asks the Chinese authorities to open a political dialogue with all the parties concerned... in order to

find one or various solution on the Oigourians question".

During a press conference organized by Mr. DUPUIS and Mr. HABSBURG-LOTHRINGEN, Mr. Erkin ALPTEKIN, President of UNPO (Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization) and President of the Alliance of the peoples of Eastern Turkenstan, inner Mongolia and Tibet, has asked last Wednesday the European Parliament to plead the cause of the people of these regions in front of Beijing.

Mr. Olivier DUPUIS, General Secretary of the Transnational Radical Party has decleared: "Despite a European Council that is incapable of reaching a common position on the Human Rights situation in China - it is exemplary its behavior during the Human Rights Commission in Geneva - the European Parliament, representing in this way the citizens of Europe, in adopting this resolution shows that, on China it is possible to have a common position and to speak with just one voice as regards the Human Rights violations committed there.