Sir, – I read with interest your report of Tánaiste Micheál Martin’s recent three-hour meeting with Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi in Beijing (News, November 7th).
While it seems that the main focus of the meeting was China’s trade relationship with Ireland and the EU, it was good to see that the Tánaiste raised some human rights concerns such as the treatment of the Uighur people, human rights defenders and the situation in Hong Kong. However, it seems that China’s ongoing crackdown on religion wasn’t mentioned at all, despite the current situation being described as the worst since the Cultural Revolution under Chairman Mao in the 1960s.
All religions have suffered in recent years –Muslims, Buddhists, Falun Gong and Christians – as the Chinese government pursues its “sinicisation” campaign to bring religion into submission under the Chinese Communist Party.
Under this sinicisation campaign crosses on church buildings have been torn down, churches closed (both government-approved and unregistered) and some buildings demolished.
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Church leaders have been imprisoned and members of unregistered churches have been harassed and discriminated against in employment, housing and business.
I wonder what Wang Yi would have said if the Tánaiste had asked him about his namesake, Pastor Wang Yi, currently serving a nine-year sentence for leading an unregistered church in Chengdu. Maybe when the Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi visits Dublin (if he accepts the Tánaiste’s invitation), the Tánaiste might ask him? – Yours, etc,
DAVID TURNER,
Director,
Church In Chains,
Glenageary,
Co Dublin.