Uyghur Canadian leaders urge Trudeau to acknowledge ‘genocide’ in Xinjiang

Uyghur community leaders in Canada asked Prime Minister Justin Trudeau why his administration has not followed Canada’s parliament in recognizing the situation in China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region as genocide.

Trudeau met with about 10 community leaders on Monday in Montreal to discuss a wide range of topics related to Xinjiang, including the possibility of banning imports of products produced by forced labor, Radio Free Asia reported.

“He said he was aware of it and looking into it. He said Canada was considering banning forced labor products coming into Canada,” Keyum Masimov, project leader of the Ottawa-based Uyghur Rights Advocacy Project, or URAP, told Radio Free Asia’s Uyghur Service on Tuesday.

Parliament voted 258-0 in support of the measure last month, echoing the February 2021 motion to recognize the situation in Xinjiang as genocide, which passed 266-0.