BEIJING, July 23 (INP): Around 100 scholars and religious personnel have sent a joint letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to express their strong indignation against those irresponsible remarks related to Xinjiang.
This was stated by the spokesperson of the Chinese Foreign Ministry Geng Shuang at a regular news briefing.
The letter was written by China Islamic Association, China Buddhist Association, the China Daoist Association, the Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association (CPA) and the Bishops Conference of the Catholic Church in China (BCCCC), and the China Christian Council.
All strongly condemned the US attacks on China’s ethnic and religious policy.
According to the spokesperson, last week the US kept slandering and smearing China’s religious policy and freedom of religious belief and interfering in China’s internal affairs.
“In response to the US wrongdoing, we have stated our stern position repeatedly.
What the US did has aroused strong opposition from the Chinese people.
In fact, what the US did has also encountered aversion and opposition in many countries, and some of them refused to attend the meeting.
The head of the biggest Muslim group in Indonesia expressed their support to Chinese government ‘s Xin Jiang-related policy in public recently, saying that certain Western countries’ accusations against China are out of political motives and inconsistent with facts.
Not long ago, ambassadors to the UN Geneva Office from Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, among other 37 countries, sent a joint letter to the president of the UN Human Rights Council and High Commissioner for Human Rights, in which they recognized the progress of human rights protection and counterterrorism and deradicalization in Xinjiang.
Recently, many more countries have joined them in supporting Chinese government by sending jointly signed letter.
As to the so-called International Religious Freedom Alliance, it’s nothing more than a tool for the US to promote its own values and interfere in others internal affairs under the pretext of religious freedom. It will surely encounter opposition in most countries and is doomed to fail.
We advise the US to respect facts and abandon bias, refrain from politicizing religious matters, blaspheming the sacred name of religion and interfering others domestic affairs and stop playing so-called world police, he added.
Meanwhile, a group of journalists from 24 countries visited northwest China’s Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region from July 14 to 22 at the invitation of China’s State Council Information Office.
During the trip, the journalists interacted extensively with local farmers, students, clerics, workers as well as trainees at vocational education and training centers.
They agreed that the Chinese government has made progress in cracking down on and preventing terrorism according to the law, safeguarding the religious freedom of its citizens, preserving traditional culture of minor ethnic groups and improving people’s livelihoods.(INP)
