Our Views and Concluding Remarks

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In international forums, China has traditionally adopted a defensive posture anchored on the principle of sovereignty and non-intervention with “internal affairs.” Since 2012, Xi Jinping’s “New Era” has advanced a concomitant, more proactive approach that promotes “human rights with Chinese characteristics” on the international stage. This approach preconizes, among others, intergovernmental dialogue and cooperation in place of vigorous international monitoring and muzzles the voices of independent domestic and international civil society members to reduce criticisms against Beijing. The embodiment of this particular b2b email list Chinese approach has real human costs—they included, to name a few, the large-scale 709 crackdowns on lawyers and activists since 2015, the “re-education camps” in Xinjiang, and the 2020 National Security Law imposed on Hong Kong (of which the ICCPR Committee called for repeal in its recently-concluded review).

Therefore, the ECtHR had good reasons to invite national authorities to pay special attention to the Chinese “apparently limited cooperation… with international human rights’ protection bodies” (para. 74). China’s refusal to engage with international human rights monitoring mechanisms appears to be the key to relieving the applicant’s burden of proof. The Court did not simply reaffirm that “the benefit of doubt should be granted to an individual seeking protection” where there are abundant allegations of serious abuses identified in independent and credible sources (para. 80). It went further to seek guarantees of protection, including any subsidiary international mechanism, of an extradited individual in countries of destination. It is noteworthy that the Court’s explicitly referred to observations of international institutions, wherein they clearly indicate a systemic failure in China’s protection against ill-treatment in its criminal justice system (para. 79).