Exiled Uighur activist Rebiya Kadeer sharply criticized the Frankfurt Book Fair for inviting China as its guest this year, arguing that the country should not be honored given its poor human rights track record.
“It is just not right to welcome a country where executions are a daily occurrence and human rights are treated with disrespect,” Kadeer, a former businesswoman who now leads the exile group the World Uyghur Congress, said at the book fair on Sunday, the last day of the fair.
“Before the Olympic Games, the world was of the opinion China would be forced to respect human rights more as the world turned its attention to the games in China,” said Kadeer, her long gray hair in her signature braids and wearing a traditional four-cornered Uighur cap.
Amnesty International in a report last year criticized China for failing to honor vows to improve rights that officials made in lobbying for the Games, and said it did not live up to commitments as an Olympic host last year.
“Instead of drawing lessons from that event, the book fair invited China as its guest ... but what happened on July 5 demonstrates how China treats human rights and its citizens,” Kadeer said, referring to violent unrest in July that shook China’s northwest region of Xinjiang, home to Muslim Uighurs.
ALLEGATIONS
China says Kadeer orchestrated the ethnic violence in July in which 200 people were killed. She denies the allegation.
Along with Tibet, Xinjiang is one of the most politically sensitive regions in China and in both places the government has sought to maintain its grip by controlling religious and cultural life while promising economic growth and prosperity.
Book Fair organizers defended their controversial choice.
“We condemn limitations of human rights and limitations of freedom of speech,” fair director Juergen Boos said. “Not talking about unpleasant subjects has not helped in the past, we have to be open and deal with them.”
The fair, the biggest of its kind, often courts controversy. Last year’s guest country, Turkey, also came under fire for its long tradition of limiting free speech.
“The Book Fair provides a cultural platform for discussion with clear rules. But it is not the United Nations,” Boos said, adding: “Our theme is literature. We can draw attention to conflicts, but we cannot solve them.”
Around 7,000 exhibitors from 100 countries came to Frankfurt this year, about the same number as last year.
Next year’s guest will be Argentina.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS