America’s Double Standard on Anti-Terrorism Will Eventually Screw Itself Up

The U.S. is only against the terrorism targeting the U.S. They seek wide support for this from the international society. But the U.S. is not so against the terrorism targeting other countries. The U.S. is not so interested in providing support for fighting terrorism and protecting justified rights in other countries.

At the end of 2013, the U.S. government sent the last three Uighur Chinese inmates at the Guantanamo Bay detention center to Slovakia. The U.S. captured 22 Uighurs in all during the war in Afghanistan and held them at the Guantanamo Bay detention center for a long term. Now all of them have been transferred to other countries.

The U.S. government declared that at least some of the 22 Uighurs captured and imprisoned by the U.S. had been trained at terror camps in Afghanistan. But after a hearing, the U.S. asserted that they are not terror suspects, thus they are eligible for release. However, Slovakia’s Ministry of the Interior emphasized that one of the three Uighurs released was a terror suspect. We do not know the basis for this statement. Since Slovakia dared to reach the conclusion, did it get cues from the information the U.S. provided?

It is noteworthy that the U.S. government has a stipulation forbidding these Uighurs to enter America. If they aren’t terrorist suspects, why does the U.S. government reject their entry? If those who have been trained at terror camps in Afghanistan are not counted as terrorist suspects, does it mean that attending terror trainings is acceptable? The Uighurs attended terror trainings for nothing but two goals: One was to work with al-Qaida for terrorist attacks in Western countries like the U.S.; the other was to go back to China for terror activities.

In fact, the U.S. is very clear about the status of these Uighurs and knows that some of them were engaged in terror activities. Therefore, under no circumstances will they be allowed to enter America. With the Guantanamo Bay detention center to be closed, the U.S. government has to transfer the terrorists in advance. Normally, criminals from China would be transferred to the Chinese government for punishment. Since these Chinese Uighurs have been engaged in activities abroad that harm the safety of China, the Chinese government shall be entitled to try them according to Chinese laws. Even if the Uighurs engaged in activities abroad that harmed the safety of the U.S., and the U.S. government gives up punishing them, U.S. authorities should also take the duty of escorting them to China, so that China could try them based on facts.

When the U.S. was suffering from the 9/11 terrorist attack, China took an active part in cooperating with the U.S. in international anti-terrorism. China closed the Wakhan Corridor between China and Afghanistan, ensuring that terrorists had no chance to migrate between China and Afghanistan. China allowed U.S. law enforcement agencies to campaign for international anti-terrorism in China and worked with the U.S. on blocking financial transfers by international terrorist organizations, which established a good mechanism for cooperation in cracking down on multinational criminal activities. China also worked with members of the international society, including the U.S., on preventing weapons of mass destruction from proliferation, ensuring these weapons and materials are inaccessible to international terrorists. In a word, China is against terrorism in any form and has collaborated effectively with the international society, including the U.S.

China’s considerable contribution to international anti-terrorism is obvious to the international society. The U.S. also spoke highly of it and regards the East Turkestan Islamic Movement as an international terrorist organization. But the U.S. always adopts double standards for cases involving terrorism-related people abroad from China. The U.S. stated that the Uighur inmates might be interrogated by Chinese police using torture, and thus rejected China’s repatriation claim. This was indeed an untenable excuse. It is within the rights and duties of the Chinese government to interrogate the terror suspects engaged in activities abroad. Since the U.S. government can hold and interrogate Chinese suspects, why can the Chinese government not do it? Even if it was truly out of solicitude for the human rights of the Uighur inmates, the U.S. could negotiate the problem with China. China is willing to follow the rules on protecting the rights of suspects that are commonly used by the international society and adopted by China. China can also consider more transparent approaches. But the U.S. was not willing to negotiate and arbitrarily thought that China was bound to interrogate suspects with torture, which reflected the dark psychology of the U.S. to some extent.

To speak bluntly, the U.S. is only against terrorism targeting the U.S. They seek wide support for this from the international society. But the U.S. is not so against terrorism targeting other countries. The U.S. is not so interested in providing support for fighting against terrorism and protecting justified rights in other countries. These double standards are just like burning a bridge after crossing it* and will benefit the U.S. at the expense of others. If the U.S. overuses them, others will lose enthusiasm for anti-terrorism in America. The U.S. is so snobbish and utilitarian that it will eventually harm itself. It is no benefit to global anti-terrorism nor is it win-win cooperation, either.

Dingli Shen is vice president & professor of the Institute of International Studies, Fudan University and a columnist for Haiwai Net.

*Translator’s note: Chinese idiom, meaning “cast someone aside when he has served his purpose.”