During HRC55, CSW delivered an oral statement, raising its concerns over Vietnam’s targeted violations against religious and ethnic minorities and China’s crackdown on religion or belief groups and human rights defenders.
Today, we pay tribute to Cao Shunli’s legacy, one that has inspired countless human rights defenders in China and abroad. We urge UN Member States to call for a full, independent, impartial investigation into her death. We reaffirm that no perpetrator of reprisals, no matter how powerful, is above scrutiny, and that reprisals are fundamentally incompatible with the values of the United Nations and of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
On the tenth anniversary of the death of Cao Shunli, the international community must honour her memory by standing up for all human rights defenders in China who have followed in her footsteps and incurred the wrath of the CCP as a result.
Today 16 international experts in freedom of religion or belief have expressed “profound and grave concerns” about the implications of the new Article 23 security law Hong Kong’s government is currently pushing through. It directly threatens religious freedom, and in particular the confidentiality of the Sacrament of Penance (otherwise known as the Sacrament of Reconciliation or “Confession”) in the Catholic Church.
