World's democracies condemned the crackdown in Hong Kong, but did nothing to impose costs on the CCP dictatorship. Instead business (read: Chinese exports) only grew and grew. Gotta empower them despots! ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Hong Kong's pro-democracy struggle presented an opportunity for democracies to stand up against dictatorship, but we failed miserably.

Giving the #CCP yet another free pass (after its repressive occupation of Tibet in 1950-1951 and the 1989 Tiananmen massacre) surely emboldened #putin to invade #Ukraine in 2022.

Repression of Tibetans, Uighurs, South-Mongolians, Hongkongers... or a billion+ voiceless Chinese brought no consequences, but at least the invasion of *European* Ukraine gave us Europeans a limited wakeup.

It's not enough. We could have aided developing democracies when the Soviet empire fell in 1989-1991 and *not aided* repressive regimes. Instead we doubled down on doing business without limits and empowered the likes of Chinese dictatorship.

There are things I love about Europe, and things I am deeply ashamed of. Talking about human rights while empowering despots belongs in the latter category.

Some foreign individuals did "Stand with Hong Kong" though. At least one here in Mastodon is, as always, still busy fighting authoritarian takeover. Now in her homeland of the USA.

“Your freedom and mine cannot be separated.“
— Nelson Mandela

@noelreports in the logic of #ruzzia undertaking a genocide against #ukraine this makes fully sense. Like abducting and "reeducating" children and grown-ups.
As #prc is doing with the #uighurs.
Still, I really can not get my head around this. How you can assume yourself to be the #masterrace and it is your "holy right" to do so.
Not during the crusades, not in any colony, not in any of the americas, africa or anywhere else.

This is disgusting!

I hoped humanity was past that!

The *victims* of the regime might be forgiven (option not available inside the empire) if they fail to appreciate the scattered unofficial nostalgia for a leading supporting cadre who served as the Party's 'premier' for a decade while, well, 'stuff' kept happening to them.

Maybe, just maybe comrade Li would have been less extreme as the supreme leader, but isn't that entire point moot since all he really ended up *doing* was rubberstamping the #XiJinping's policies we've all come to love and appreciate?

The #PRC/#CCP stopped "biding time" a decade ago and comrade Li was right in the middle of it as supreme leader's number 2.

#LiKeqiang #hagiography #China #dictatorship #Hongkong #Tibet #EastTurkistan #Uighurs #SouthMongolia #SCS #9dashline #militaryexpansionism #authaxis
@LetaHong @liyuan6

If I may, L.O.L.

CCP as the proud guardian, nay, global Leader of protecting cultures and heritage (with new characteristics, obvs.)...

The title of that piece somewhat lacking in critical assessment was: "What’s Behind China’s New Alliance for Cultural Heritage in Asia?"

Still left wondering "what is behind it" in the author Tim Winter's opinion.

I know what's behind it in terms of utter genocidal devastation since 1950s *and counting*...

#ccp #prc #china #culturalrevolution #genocide #tibet #Uighurs #Mongolia #Hongkong
@Maximilian_Mayer

And at the same time the #CCP #dictatorship of #China has been forcibly #sinicizing #Tibetan children for *decades* using similar methods.

When the clear intention is destroying the identity of people under occupation it is #genocide.

The world is finally, still too slowly, waking up to the dangers of hostile despotism, but the evidence of it has been there for anyone interested to see for decades.

Also, CCP getting away with enslaving Tibet emboldened it to crush the #Uighurs, and #putin to try the same by invading #Ukraine.

The despots facing no consequences meant their victims faced it all. At least Ukraine is getting the help they deserve.

#Democracies simply put business far ahead of the most basic moral considerations for decades...

@fulelo

Could you do a blurb on your feelings about "pro-China" comments too?

Complete with a "fun fact"?

Maybe even one about the #CCP, or is that *too* complicated?

Some people recognize the #chinese #dictatorship to be an entity separate from its disenfranchised subjects.

#china #imperialism #colonialism #Tibet #Hongkong #Mongolia #Uighurs #9dashline
@liztai

@6G @breadandcircuses
Umm...
The CCP (Chinese Communist Party?) controls tiktok, you say.
Quite ready to believe that.
For me, that does not make watching tiktok liberating or informative: given the CCP's reputation for thought control just of the #Uighurs alone, without considering other offensive behaviour in this area, makes me vow never to watch tiktok .
'Relaxing & liberating' are, for me, an ironic description.

Idea that human extinction not due for 200 yrs seems over-optimistic.

Pastor Niemöller had something to say about this sort of solidarity and those who understood his message find it hard to appreciate #WTA's "principles" here...

The sports circus/business WTA saying this is one thing, but @humanrightswatch ...?

There is something fundamentally wrong with free peoples' opportunistic, appeasing and accommodating approach to the world's largest #dictatorship.

Yes, #FreePengShuai, but No to #NormalizingRepression.

#FirstTheyCame #Tibet #Uighurs #genocide #HongKong #humanrights #CCP #PRC #china #authoritarianism
@JanKooy
@humanrightswatch

re: "Atrocity-denial is the lowest form of punditry."

Btw, when was the last time y'all read *anything* about the roof-of-the-world -sized prison called #Tibet ?

Our civilization needs to learn how to multitask *and* how not to forget out of convenience.

It's not hard to argue that #putin was emboldened to embark on the genocidal invasion of #Ukraine *because* the neighbouring #dictatorship had *not* faced any tangible consequences over its #lebensraum genocides...

Two dictatorships with 19th century mindset bossing over the #UN... what could go wrong.

#CCP #PRC #china #tibetans #uighurs #SlavaUkraini #journalism #globalism #genocide #imperialism #UnitedNations #OutOfSightOutOfMind
@PaulaChertok

@radeksikorski : “Do you really want us to wonder every time we consider buying a Chinese product whether it will finance Putin's war?“

Maybe we should also ask #Tibetans, #Uighurs, #Hongkongers and the over a billion voiceless #Chinese subjects of the never-elected #CCP #dictatorship about the issue of funding and trading with the #PRC regime?

And how about all the autocrats and despots across the world funded and supported by the CCP in its #UnitedFront campaign to fight and crush it's greatest existential threat #democracy globally?

@radeksikorski : “it would again divide the world into warring blocs“

Maybe it's time to stop aiding and abetting *all* dictatorships and concentrate on supporting the actual values the #UnitedNations was founded to protect and nurture?

#authoritarianism #genocide #putin #russia #xijinping #china #ufwd #pla #Tibet #EastTurkestan #Hongkong #Taiwan #SouthChinaSea #India #EuropeanUnion #WarOnDemocracy
@EPPGroup