Since taking office in October, he has multiplied missions in Sudan and Ukraine. In Haiti, in February, he warned of the dramatic situation on the island. But it is on human rights in China that Volker Türk is most awaited. His predecessor, Michelle Bachelet, criticized on this issue, had repeatedly postponed the publication of a report on Beijing’s abuses against the Uighurs in Xinjiang province.
Can your agency still investigate in China, when Beijing’s growing weight in the UN system does not leave much room for manoeuvre? We remember that the missions of the World Health Organization in Wuhan were not very successful.
The human rights situation in China is of great concern to me. The report of M.me Bachelet insisted on Xinjiang, but I would like to stress that we are also following with concern the situation in Tibet, in Hong Kong, as well as the hardening of civic space. The independent mandate given to us by the UN General Assembly is to engage in dialogue with each of the Member States on the issue of human rights. Things are obviously not always simple, and you have to adapt to the country in which you would like to see the situation evolve. We are in dialogue with China to let it know which practices, measures and laws are not in conformity with the International Bill of Human Rights.
The UN celebrates this year the 75th anniversary of René Cassin’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The impression is that the latter are retreating, almost everywhere. You ask for the doubling of your budget and to be present in the 193 countries of the United Nations. Is it realistic?
You always have to have aspirations. One of my predecessors, Louise Arbour, succeeded in doubling the funding of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in 2005. Today, human rights violations are massive, there are setbacks, including in democratic countries, and we have conflicts everywhere, even in Europe, with this war of aggression by Russia in Ukraine, which has brought back this quasi-medieval specter of direct state-to-state conflict. So we really have to repeat to the whole world that if it takes the question of human rights seriously, it must do a lot more: resources, political and strategic support. It won’t happen overnight, but it’s up to me to claim it.
Some countries, especially in Africa, refuse even your presence on the ground…
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