Turkey attacks China ‘genocide’

In 1948, the United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide defined genocide as “any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: killing members of the group; causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life, calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; [and] forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.”  This definition comes from Wikipedia online.  I have presented this definition in light of the news events happening in China’s Xinjian region.  This news story comes from the BBC news. Genocide of any distinct group whether it be Kurds, Armenians, Rwanda’s Tutsis, Jews to name a few, is  indeed, a crime against humanity and democracy.

“Turkey’s prime minister has described ethnic violence in China’s Xinjiang region as “a kind of genocide”.
“There is no other way of commenting on this event,” Recep Tayyip Erdogan said.

The death toll from the violence there has now risen from 156 to 184, China’s state-run Xinhua news agency reports. More than 1,000 people were injured.  Turkey, a predominantly Muslim country, shares linguistic and religious links with the Uighurs in China’s western-most region.

“The event taking place in China is a kind of genocide,” Mr Erdogan told reporters in Turkey’s capital, Ankara.
“There are atrocities there, hundreds of people have been killed and 1,000 hurt. We have difficulty understanding how China’s leadership can remain a spectator in the face of these events.”

The Turkish premier also urged Beijing to “address the question of human rights and do what is necessary to prosecute the guilty”.

Mr Erdogan’s comments came a day after Turkish Trade and Industry Minister Nihat Ergun urged Turks to boycott Chinese goods. But it said that of the 184 people who died, 137 were Han Chinese.

Earlier on Friday, the Chinese authorities reimposed a night-time curfew in Urumqi. The curfew had been suspended for two days after officials said they had the city under control. Mosques in the city were ordered to remain closed on Friday and notices were posted instructing people to stay at home to worship.

But at least two opened after crowds of Uighurs gathered outside and demanded to be allowed in to pray on the holiest day of the week in Islam.

“We decided to open the mosque because so many people had gathered. We did not want an incident,” a policeman outside the White Mosque in a Uighur neighbourhood told the AP news agency.

After the prayers, riot police punched and kicked a small group of Uighurs protesters, who demanded the release of men detained after last Sunday’s violence, the BBC’s Quentin Sommerville says.

Meanwhile, the city’s main bus station was reported to be crowded with people trying to escape the unrest.

The violence began on Sunday when a Uighur rally to protest against a deadly brawl between Uighurs and Han Chinese several weeks ago in a toy factory in southern Guangdong province turned violent.

Tensions have been growing in Xinjiang for many years, as Han migrants have poured into the region, where the Uighur minority is concentrated.

Many Uighurs feel economic growth has bypassed them and complain of discrimination and diminished opportunities.”

Read the whole story here.

World leaders grapple with crisis

World leaders are to continue talks on measures to limit the current financial turmoil at a summit in Washington. They hope to agree on long-term reforms to cut the risk of further crises and a coordinated economic stimulus plan. Efforts are focused on five hours of formal talks on Saturday. The summit began with a working dinner on Friday.

Divisions have emerged between Europe, which wants stricter market rules, and the US and other countries, which prefer more moderate reforms. Opening the two-day summit at the White House, US President George W Bush dampened hopes for quick solutions.

Bush speaks to G20 leaders

“This problem did not develop overnight and it will not be solved overnight, but with continued cooperation and determination it will be solved,” he said.

The participants hope to agree on a common set of principles for future reform, including changes to the organisations charged with regulating the world economy.

Leaders are close to agreeing a concrete action plan on financial regulation, the AFP news agency quoted a high-ranking French official as saying.

But US President-elect Barack Obama is not attending, raising concerns over the lack of guarantee that any proposals agreed by Mr Bush will be implemented by his successor.
Everyone is affected by this downfall. Budgets of households and big corporations are equally affected

Asif Chaudhry, Pakistan

Later summits are expected to focus on working out the details of the reforms needed.
Speaking after the opening dinner, German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck said “the window of opportunities [for financial reform] has never been so wide open as at present”.

Meeting on the sidelines of the summit, the Japanese, Chinese and South Korean finance ministers said they might expand their mutual currency swap arrangements.

‘Prosperity and hope’
Earlier, President Bush had insisted the financial crisis was not a failure of free-market capitalism.
Speaking in New York, he said the surest way back to sustained economic growth was not to reinvent the system, but to reform it.

“The answer [...] is to fix the problems we face, make the reforms we need, and move forward with the free-market principles that have delivered prosperity and hope to people all across the globe,” he said.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said that he thought it was unlikely that the major economies of the world would consent to external control of their regulatory systems.
“Compulsory governance… is unrealistic,” he said.

However, European leaders have signalled that they are seeking more far-reaching initiatives.
“We want to change the rules of the game in the financial world,” said French President Nicolas Sarkozy. German Chancellor Angela Merkel said she was surprised to hear warnings against too much regulation of financial markets when the crisis had not yet been overcome.

China holds the cards

China is likely to be key to any reforms agreed.
With nearly $2 trillion in foreign exchange reserves and an economy that is still expanding, albeit at a slower pace, it is one of the few countries attending that has the cash to help countries in distress.
UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown has taken the lead in urging China and other countries with big cash stockpiles to finance the International Monetary Fund so that it can make more emergency loans.
“We will actively participate in rescue activities for this international financial crisis,” said Yi Gang, deputy governor of the Chinese central bank.

However, in exchange China is likely to want to hold more power at the IMF, which is dominated by the US and the EU. Japan has announced it is prepared to lend up to $100bn to the IMF to help emerging economies hit by the financial crisis. The G20 meeting is bringing together both leading industrial powers such as the US, Japan and Germany, and emerging market countries such as China, India and Brazil.

The countries represent 85% of the world economy.

News Source – BBC News