The international community trumpets its commitment to ‘universal human rights’. Yet, it has failed to take real action against Beijing for its treatment of minorities in Xinjiang.
In China, Robeson continues to be remembered as a loyal friend celebrated for popularizing what became China’s national anthem and building solidarity between peoples of China and African Americans.
Meredith Oyen, University of Maryland, Baltimore County
Taiwanese authorities are allowing its tiny contingent to attend the opening ceremony in Beijing despite a long-running dispute over its name in the Olympics.
The International Olympic Committee’s position is clear. Human rights be damned. Refugees be damned. The Games must go on. The rest is window dressing.
The disappearance of Peng further underlines the need for an international boycott of the 2022 Beijing Olympics. The CCP’s assaults on democracy activists deserve more than willful blindness.
New school textbooks in China focus less on the Chinese Communist Party and more on its figurehead Xi Jinping. The growing cultivation of a personality cult is reminiscent of the days of Mao Zedong.
It is reasonable to assume Xi has close supporters within the party leadership. However, they are not as visible, for the most part, as was the case for Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping.
History will weigh heavily on the meeting in Beijing this week, which will affirm the Chinese president’s power and outline the political agenda for the coming years.
President Xi Jinping’s nationalist agenda includes supporting traditional Chinese religious beliefs and practices – as long as their leaders support the Chinese Communist Party.
A new report has found students and academics critical of China’s Communist Party are being harassed and intimidated by supporters of Beijing. Universities must do more to protect academic freedom.
The Chinese Communist Party sees liberal values as a threat to its rule and needs many of them to be suppressed. Its approach? Co-opt, ignore and selectively exploit global institutions.
Australian universities must take tougher actions to punish pro-China students who intimidate others. But the media must also be careful not to deem all China supporters as threats to democracy.