New Zealand rugby star joins Ozil, speaks out against China’s treatment of Uighurs
DHARAMSALA, 23 Dec: New Zealand rugby star Sonny Bill Williams has become the latest sports star to criticise the Chinese communist regime over its treatment of the Uighur Muslims.
Williams, the world’s best-paid rugby player has followed Arsenal midfielder Mesut Ozil and took to the social media to condemn China’s treatment of its Uighur minority while criticising others for choosing “economic benefits over humanity”.
“It’s a sad time when we choose economic benefits over humanity,” Williams said in a rewet earlier today.
The two-time rugby union World Cup winner’s tweet accompanied an illustration of a hand painted with the Chinese flag squeezing an arm painted with East Turkestan dripping with blood.
On December 13, in an Instagram post, Ozil, a German Muslim of Turkish origin has criticised Beijing for its ongoing human rights abuses and persecution of Uighur Muslims and berated fellow Muslims for failing to speak up.
While UN experts and activists say at least one million ethnic Uighurs and other Muslims are held in the detention centres in East Turkistan, Beijing maintains that the camps are voluntary education and training centre.
However, China’s ambassador to Australia went a step further and called such reports “fake news”, seeking to excuse mass incarceration as a deradicalisation measure earlier last week,
Meanwhile, the US House of Representative has overwhelmingly passed a bill that calls for a tough response to China’s crackdown on Uighur Muslims in East Turkistan earlier this month on 3 Dec.
The Uighur Act of 2019 cleared the house with 407-1 votes. The bill which has bipartisan support now needs to clear the Senate before it is tabled to be signed by US President Donal Trump.
