Dominic Raab hints UK could boycott China's Winter Olympics over Uighur Muslims treatment

Danielle Sheridan
·3 min read
A police officer points a pistol at protesters during a rally in Hong Kong in December 2019 to show support for the Uighur Muslim minority in China - Dale de la Rey/AFP
A police officer points a pistol at protesters during a rally in Hong Kong in December 2019 to show support for the Uighur Muslim minority in China - Dale de la Rey/AFP

The Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab has suggested Britain may boycott the Olympics for the first time ever, over China's treatment of the Uighur Muslims.

He told MPs at a Foreign Affairs Select Committee it was “clear that there is evidence of serious and egregious human rights violations” of the Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang province and did not rule out boycotting the Beijing Winter Olympics in 2022 as a consequence.

Mr Raab said: "Generally speaking, my instinct is to separate sport from diplomacy and politics, but there comes a point where that may not be possible.

“I would say let's gather the evidence, work with our international partners and consider in the round what further action we need to take.”

The UK has never before boycotted an Olympic Games, despite pressure not to participate in the 1936 Berlin Olympics produced under the Nazi regime in Germany, and in the Moscow Games in 1980 following Russia’s invasion of Afghanistan.

During the committee hearing Labour MP Graham Stringer said he wished to remind Mr Raab of “Margaret Thatcher's problems of the 1980 Olympic games in Moscow”.

“She failed,” he said.

Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab did not rule out boycotting the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics  -  Stefan Rousseau/PA
Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab did not rule out boycotting the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics - Stefan Rousseau/PA

Mr Raab added that “the detention, the mistreatment, the forced sterilisation” of the Uighur Muslim people was something the UK “can't just turn away from".

“Obviously we'll want to gather the evidence and work very closely with our international partners,” he said.

“We need to be making the point to China that this is at odds with the responsibilities that come with a leading member of the international community."

Asked if he would advise the Duke of Cambridge against attending the Olympics, Mr Raab said: "That would be a corollary of the wider process of evaluating evidence and working with our international partners and whatever further decisions we come to.”

It comes as the UK has sought to increase international pressure on China over human rights abuses, with the UK becoming home to a number of Uighur Muslim dissidents, such as as Aziz Isa Elkun, below.

Aziz Isa Elkun is one of many Uighur Muslims living in London who have been cut off from contacting their families based in Xinjiang. He alleges he has received threatening text messages from the Chinese state . The last time Aziz Isa Elkun saw his elderly mother and father in the disputed Chinese province of Xinjiang was more than two years ago. Since then, his father has died and he has no idea about the safety go his mother and cousins , after China launched a brutal crackdown on its Muslim Uighur population. London 11August 2020 - Heathcliff O'Malley/Heathcliff O'Malley

At the United Nations, the UK was one of 39 countries to raise concerns about the abuse of Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang, as well as the security crackdown in Hong Kong.

The UK and its allies, including Germany, France and the US, have agreed a statement in which they said they were "gravely concerned about the existence of a large network of 'political re-education' camps" in Xinjiang, where "credible reports indicated that over a million people have been arbitrarily detained".

It is believed the Chinese government has detained up to one million of the Uighur Muslim population in “re-education camps” in the region.

The Chinese Ambassador to the UK, Liu Xiaoming, has previously called allegations about human rights abuses in Xinjiang the “lies of the century”.