A speech delivered by Zubayra Shamseden of UHRP on the 2019 annual ‘Hold Taiwan Free’ occasion in New York on September 7, 2019
Pricey Jenny and different organizers of this nice occasion.
I’m honored to be right here in the present day to affix you and assist you to ‘Hold Taiwan Free’ from the Chinese language Communist authorities’s totalitarian regime.
Taiwan is at the moment a free and democratic state. It’s a beacon of hope for these inside mainland China beneath the dictatorial regime of Xi Jinping. It’s a society the place freedom of expression with out persecution, detention, torture, and disappearance is feasible. It’s a model of what China could be, the place corrupt state officers, government-backed elites, and chosen “patriotic” individuals could be tried via its political system, the place its residents can dwell with out concern of the federal government demolishing their houses or disappearing them into black jails for talking about their rights as residents. It’s a place the place individuals can apply their faiths and beliefs with out kowtowing to Xi Jinping and the CCP.
Hong Kong was additionally as soon as a spot comparatively free from CCP management via its one nation two programs coverage. We’ve got all watched because the individuals of Hong Kong come out to protest when the CCP moved to realize extra management over the area via its extradition invoice. Now, three months on, the demonstrators have proven us what unity, the individuals, and democracy in motion can appear to be in opposition to an authoritarian regime.
But the CCP won’t again down. As an alternative of listening to respectable complaints from Hong Kong, they’ve proven us an unwillingness to work for its individuals, and reacted with police brutality, arrests, violence, concern, rigidity, and by bringing of their military. This isn’t a “individuals’s republic.” That is Xi Jinping’s dictatorship.
The state of affairs in Hong Kong proper now could be a turning level – the best way Tiananmen Sq. was a turning level. The way in which the July fifth, 2009 bloodbath of protestors in Urumchi was a turning level for Uyghurs. Protest, crackdown, and silence. That’s what occurred up to now. The world didn’t reply to China then. 1000’s had been killed, and 1000’s extra disappeared. The world believed China would resolve their inner issues and transfer to turn into a greater nation. The world was mistaken.
After 2009, the CCP created its most securitized surveillance state in East Turkestan, an open-air jail on all accounts, and detained as much as 3 million of its residents in focus camps. What’s occurring to the Uyghurs is a blueprint for what can occur to the remainder of China, and if unchecked, many of those techniques to manage individuals will enter – and are already coming into – Hong Kong, Taiwan and the remainder of the world.
Hold Hong Kong free. Hold Taiwan free. Time and time once more the CCP have confirmed to us that we can’t consider their empty guarantees. We want true democracy and freedom. We have to worth our identification, price, beliefs, and dignity – we want to withstand CCP assimilation. Don’t quit on what makes you who you’re. We want to have the ability to dwell with out concern of persecution based mostly on our totally different appearances, our languages, beliefs, cultures, and existence; with out concern that these facets of ourselves might be destroyed in favor of full conformity to the Celebration’s will. We have to dwell with out the concern and devastation of household separation, compelled marriages, the destruction of personal life with authorities state officers actually dwelling in our houses, forcing us to eat, sleep, and dwell with the very individuals who oppress us. That is what’s going to occur if we don’t preserve Taiwan free. We want Freedom to maneuver into China; we are not looking for the CCP’s regime to unfold to the remainder of the world.
Taiwan has been an instance to thousands and thousands of Chinese language people who additionally deserve an open, free society. Every Chinese language individual, who wishes freedom ought to assist and defend the democracy in Taiwan.
At present the Chinese language communist authorities beneath Xi, as a substitute of utilizing Taiwan as a task mannequin to implement democratic rule in China, intends to make it part of China like East Turkestan, Tibet and Southern Mongolia.
Our Uyghur, Tibetan, Mongol and different Chinese language democracy motion activism and the present atrocity that’s going down in East Turkestan proves that beneath the Chinese language communist regime, it’s not possible to have freedom, democracy, peace, justice, equality and a humane life.
Everybody right here in the present day – all of our fates are related. It is a essential time for us, a turning level in historical past, and it’s essential that we battle collectively, and work collectively, to:
Hold Taiwan Free, Hold Hong Kong free,
Make East Turkestan, Tibet and Inside Mongolia free from the Chinese language dictatorship.
