WHEN you push people hard enough, they either take up arms or file a case at the court.
Two Uighur exiled activist groups have opted for the latter. According to The New York Times, a team of London-based lawyers representing the activists filed a complaint at the International Criminal Court (ICC) on Monday against China "for pursuing the repatriation of thousands of Uighurs through unlawful arrests in or deportation from Cambodia and Tajikistan".
This move by the English lawyers may be a way around the ICC's jurisdiction problem over China, which is not a signatory of the Rome Treaty that created the ICC. Not all 193 countries of the world are signatories.
Countries can choose not to sign. The Rome Treaty even appears to allow countries to "unsign" the treaty, like the United States did during the presidency of George W. Bush.
Such provisions make nonsense of international law. Powerful nations, especially the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, must set a better example for the remaining 188 countries in the world to follow.
There is too much of hypocrisy in the world for justice to work at the international level.
China should not be troubled at all by this case or others that may come its way. In fact, Beijing should take the case brought by the two activist organisations — East Turkistan Government in Exile and East Turkistan National Awakening Movement — as an opportunity to prove to the world that China is innocent of all charges.
China could choose to argue that the ICC has no jurisdiction over China as it is not a signatory of the Rome Treaty, like Myanmar recently did at the ICC. It should not so argue for three reasons.
One reason is that the ICC, in September 2018, in a Rohingya inquiry against Myanmar, ruled that it has jurisdiction when crimes start or end in member states.
There, the genocide and crimes against humanity ended in member-state Bangladesh. This is the reason for the clever move by the English legal team. The real target is something bigger: to ask the ICC to investigate Beijing for genocide and crimes against humanity.
Two, if China is really innocent of the charges, it will be wise to use the court as a forum to tell the world that the genocide and crimes against humanity charges are mere fabrications.
Better still, allow the ICC complete freedom to make its own findings. To attempt to argue the lack of ICC's jurisdiction over China will send the wrong signal to the global community.
This is the route Myanmar's military regime and Aung San Suu Kyi took, denying, even to this very day, accountability for genocide and crimes against humanity.
To that extent, Myanmar's and Suu Kyi's reputation has suffered globally. No one trusts them. China must be wiser.
Three, a full hearing of the case, should the court decide in China's favour, can also help Beijing silence its growing list of critics, especially the Western media.
International non-governmental organisations and foreign governments, through Western media, have long accused China of persecuting the Uighurs and socially reengineering them in high-security camps.
To date, China has used its official channels and government media to deny the charges. Citing bias, the West doesn't pay too much heed to such denials.
The ICC, being an international court, has a higher trust level, especially in the West. China must take it.