The U.S. Congress is urged to remove barriers to receiving U.S. visas and extend refugee visas for Hong Kong residents, based on the Congressional-Executive Commission on China (CECC)’s latest annual report.
“The 2023 Annual Report reflects the view of CECC commissioners that the failure of the government of the PRC and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to fulfill its obligations under international treaties, along with its systematic violation of human rights, pose a challenge to the rules-based international order and to the safety and security of U.S. citizens and residents,” reads a statement from the Commission.
“These challenges require robust efforts by the U.S. and its allies to address genocide; stanch the import of forced labor made goods; circumvent censorship of the free flow of news and information; stop malign influence operations targeting U.S. citizens and their families; and shine a light on the arbitrary detention and torture of political prisoners in China and Hong Kong.”
The report details various human rights abuses and legal issues in China, highlighting significant events like the White Paper Movement, which arose in response to China’s stringent zero-COVID policies. The movement saw citizens openly opposing censorship and restrictions on personal freedoms, calling for political reforms in the CCP.
The report also sheds light on the CCP’s continuing human rights violations, including forced labor, transnational repression, imprisonment of Chinese activists and Hong Kong political prisoners, genocide in Xinjiang, suppression of religious followers including the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners, and erosion of cultural and linguistic identities among Tibetan and Uyghur minorities.
A new chapter entitled “Technology-Enhanced Authoritarianism” is included in the latest report, discussing “the role that new technologies play in surveillance, censorship, and repression of fundamental freedoms in the PRC and around the world.”
Regarding Hong Kong, the CECC advises Congress to pass the Hong Kong Judicial Sanctions Act (S. 3177/H.R. 6153), which “requires a review of all sanctions with possible application in those areas.”
Several other suggestions for the city are also given to the Congress and the administration, including:
■ Coordinate sanctions and messaging about political prisoners in Hong Kong with the United Kingdom and other like-minded nations to amplify the impact of diplomatic efforts;
■ Expand media accelerator and investigative journalism projects to preserve the flow of independent news and information from Hong Kong and create academic residency programs for Hong Kong journalists and executives whose news and media outlets were shuttered due to abuse or threats under the National Security Law;
■ Remove barriers for Hong Kong residents to receive U.S. visas, including by extending Priority 2 refugee status to those attempting to exit Hong Kong for fear of political persecution, and publish a plan to address the long-term status and treatment of Hong Kong citizens in the United States;
■ Permanently extend the prohibition on sales of police equipment and crowd control technology to the Hong Kong police;
■ Pass the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office Certification Act (S. 490 / H.R. 1103) to consider removal of the diplomatic privileges given to Hong Kong’s three offices in the United States.
Established in 2000, the CECC comprises nine Senators, nine Representatives, and five senior officials appointed by the President. The commission monitors human rights and the rule of law in China and provides policy recommendations to Congress.
“The Annual Report sets the standard in terms of documenting the PRC’s failure to abide by human rights norms and in holding Xi Jinping and the CCP accountable for their repeated and sustained atrocities and crimes against humanity – up to and including that most pernicious of human rights violations, genocide,” said CECC Chair Rep. Christopher Smith (R-N.J.).
“The annual report will continue to guide Congress and the Administration on PRC policy, and I hope provide corporations with clarity, so that they are no longer complicity in the subsidization of tyranny. Above all, it is my hope that the long-suffering people in Communist China know through our report that they have not been forgotten, and that they, and we, can look forward to that day when oppression ends.”
CECC Co-chair Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) noted that the report “highlights the new ways that Chinese authorities are violating their citizens’ basic rights, including the use of digital and biometric surveillance and transnational repression of Americans and others.”
“The people of China deserve to enjoy the full range of human rights to which they are entitled under international law. As the Congressional-Executive Commission on China documents in this report, the Chinese government continues to deny them their ability to exercise these rights,” he said.
“[The report] calls attention to the prisoners of conscience for whom we must continue to raise our voices. I urge Congress and the Biden Administration to act on the CECC’s policy recommendations.”
