BARCELONA, Spain—The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) declined to attend a summons from the Spanish National Assembly last week. It demanded that Spain “assume its responsibilities” and “definitively stop” the investigation by judge Santiago Pedraz into the regime’s alleged involvement in the repression in Tibet of March 2008. The investigation targets three ministers and high functionaries for their alleged involvement in the events in Tibet, four months before the Olympic Games in Beijing.
Magistrate Pedraz sent a rogatory letter to Party officials in May of this year; the July 6 refusal to attend hearings was the regime’s first response. In the letter, Pedraz asked permission to interrogate, as persons charged, eight individuals alleged to have commissioned “crimes against humanity,” including deaths, serious injuries, forced disappearances, detentions, torture, and deprivations of liberty in Tibet.
According to the calculations of the judge, the actions of the Chinese military led to “at least 203 deaths, more than 1000 serious injuries, and 5,972 illegal detentions and disappearances.”
In 2006, Spain became the first country to accept criminal lawsuits against the Chinese communist regime, after the Constitutional Tribunal determined its competency to investigate crimes of genocide, independent of the place where they were committed and the nationality of the victims. In Spain there are currently two open cases for alleged crimes perpetrated by the communist regime against the Tibetan people, and another for alleged crimes against practitioners of the Falun Gong spiritual discipline.
Even so, due to the pressure from the US, Israel, and China, the Spanish government, in an agreement with the People’s Party, decided to modify the law that regulates the Principle of Universal Jurisdiction. With the change, Spanish courts may now only accept cases that affect Spanish citizens.
Magistrate Pedraz sent a rogatory letter to Party officials in May of this year; the July 6 refusal to attend hearings was the regime’s first response. In the letter, Pedraz asked permission to interrogate, as persons charged, eight individuals alleged to have commissioned “crimes against humanity,” including deaths, serious injuries, forced disappearances, detentions, torture, and deprivations of liberty in Tibet.
According to the calculations of the judge, the actions of the Chinese military led to “at least 203 deaths, more than 1000 serious injuries, and 5,972 illegal detentions and disappearances.”
In 2006, Spain became the first country to accept criminal lawsuits against the Chinese communist regime, after the Constitutional Tribunal determined its competency to investigate crimes of genocide, independent of the place where they were committed and the nationality of the victims. In Spain there are currently two open cases for alleged crimes perpetrated by the communist regime against the Tibetan people, and another for alleged crimes against practitioners of the Falun Gong spiritual discipline.
Even so, due to the pressure from the US, Israel, and China, the Spanish government, in an agreement with the People’s Party, decided to modify the law that regulates the Principle of Universal Jurisdiction. With the change, Spanish courts may now only accept cases that affect Spanish citizens.
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