The Meat Industry Association said human rights concerns should be kept out of trade, as it welcomes China’s bid to join the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
Ethnic Uyghurs took part in a protest march in Brussels calling on the EU to call on China to respect human rights in China’s Xinjiang region and demanding the closure of the “re-education center” where some Uyghurs are inmates.
Photo: AFP or licensor
Signatories to the trade deal, like Australia, have already expressed deep concern over the mass incarceration of Uyghur Muslims in the Xinjiang region.
But a leading New Zealand export body, the Meat Industry Association, said Aotearoa should support the offer.
Chief Executive Officer Sirma Karapeeva said geopolitical and trade issues are separate.
“The government has spoken very clearly about New Zealand’s approach to a sovereign and autonomous approach to foreign policy, and I think it’s important to keep geopolitical issues out of trade issues.
“They’re separate and they don’t necessarily need to bleed into each other.”
However, China’s treatment of human rights is of global concern.
In May, parliament unanimously called for action to prevent serious human rights violations against Uyghur Muslims, in a motion that did not qualify the violations as genocide.
China responded with a statement from the Chinese Embassy website that the statement was “in total disregard of China’s solemn position” and said that “this decision grossly interferes with China’s internal affairs.” .
MP Louisa Wall went even further and broke with Labor to accuse China of harvesting organs from political prisoners.
Amnesty International’s New Zealand director said an international mission was urgently needed after the group’s report called China’s treatment of Uyghurs a “dystopian hellish landscape.”
Taiwan, which is seeking to join the partnership, has expressed concern over China’s candidacy, saying its recent policies lack transparency.
