The United States has joined 14 nations in issuing a joint statement calling for the immediate release of all individuals unjustly detained by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) for exercising their fundamental freedom.
The statement highlights the CCP’s persistent use of detention, forced labor, mass surveillance, and restrictions on religious and cultural expression, calling these practices a cause for concern.
“We share ongoing deep concerns about serious violations occurring in China,” reads the statement released by the United States Mission to the United Nations on Nov. 21.
“Ethnic and religious minority groups—particularly Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities, Christians, Tibetans, Falun Gong practitioners, and others—have faced targeted repression, including through separation of children from families in boarding schools, torture, and the destruction of cultural heritage.”
The nations also voiced concerns about the “continued dismantling of long-standing civil liberties and the rule of law in Hong Kong” as well as “the issuance of arrest warrants and bounties on individuals outside Hong Kong’s borders for exercising freedom of expression.”
The CCP’s suppression of journalists, human rights defenders, and lawyers—both within and beyond its borders—“further exemplify a climate of fear designed to silence criticism,” they said.
“We call on the People’s Republic of China to release all those unjustly detained for simply exercising their human rights and fundamental freedoms, which are cornerstones of legitimate governance and global credibility, and to fully comply with its obligations under international law,” the statement reads.
Aside from the United States, Albania, Australia, Czechia, Estonia, Israel, Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, North Macedonia, Palau, Paraguay, San Marino, Ukraine, and the United Kingdom also signed this statement.
They urged member states of the United Nations to press the CCP to address human rights violations and “advance meaningful accountability.”
The statement came less than a week after 18 pastors and leaders of Zion Church, one of the largest underground Christian churches in China, were formally arrested by the authorities. That includes Ezra Jin, the Zion Church’s founder, who was detained in early October in a coordinated suppression spanning several cities. His daughter, who lives in the United States, is calling on the Trump administration to intervene and press Beijing for their release.
Under the CCP’s stringent control, only churches registered with state-controlled organizations are allowed to operate in the country. Believers and leaders outside these state-approved religious organizations face constant surveillance, harassment, arrest, and other forms of punishment, according to a September fact sheet issued by the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. It noted that the regime has required clergy to preach CCP ideology, ordered the removal of crosses from churches, and carried out other efforts to “sinicize“ religions—a drive aimed at aligning religious doctrines with the CCP’s stance.
The 15 nations’ call for action also comes amid the CCP’s nationwide campaign to eradicate Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, a spiritual practice centered on the principles of truth, compassion, and tolerance.
In the eastern Chinese city of Jinan, nearly 40 Falun Gong practitioners were arrested in late September, according to Minghui.org, a website dedicated to tracking the persecution of Falun Gong. As of Nov. 21, at least 16 remain in custody, it said.
The CCP initiated the brutal persecution in 1999, after the practice, which was introduced to the public in China in 1992, quickly spread by word of mouth to reach an estimated 70 million to 100 million practitioners. Since then, many have been subjected to arrest, detention, forced labor, torture, or death by forced organ harvesting for refusing to give up their faith.
In Hong Kong, Beijing continues to silence critics and curtail the basic freedoms through a national security law enacted five years ago, Western officials and rights groups have said.
On Nov. 3, the Hong Kong High Court rejected a prominent pro-democracy activist’s application to dismiss her indictment. Chow Hang-tung, founder of a now-defunct group that once organized the city’s annual vigils to commemorate victims of the CCP’s 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, was charged in 2021 with inciting subversion under a Beijing-imposed national security law.
The vaguely worded legislation criminalizes speeches or actions deemed secessionist, subversive, terrorist, or colluding with foreign forces against the communist regime, with punishments as severe as life imprisonment. As of March, at least 320 people have been arrested on allegations of violating the security law, the U.S. State Department said in the latest annual report on the city’s investment climate, released in late September.
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