Installation of Marx statue in Trier – China’s poisoned gift

The Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) criticizes the installation of a five-and-a-half-meter-high Marx statue in Trier. “The glorifying Marx statue is a poisoned gift from official China – and it sad that Trier decided to accept a gift by a government that uses state terror against its own people. Other German municipalities try to advocate for human rights, and some have their own human rights awards – such as Trier’s partner city Weimar,” stated Ulrich Delius, the STP’s director, in Göttingen on Thursday. “But instead of promoting human rights, Trier is creating a place of pilgrimage for Communist Party officials who are instrumentalizing Marx’s ideology to justify arbitrary censorship, arbitrary arrests, torture, and murder. This Friday the 13th will not be a lucky day for Trier – and neither for the 1.4 billion Chinese who are systematically denied basic human rights such as freedom of religion, freedom of the press and opinion.”

“Trier’s partner city Weimar was much more courageous and aware of democratic values when the Uyghur scientist Ilham Tohti was honored with the city’s Human Rights Award in 2017 – despite massive protests from China,” Delius emphasized. Tohti had been sentenced to life imprisonment in the People’s Republic solely because of his commitment for the rights of the persecuted Muslim Uyghurs and his efforts to promote understanding between the Uyghurs and the Han Chinese. Tourism is also important to Weimar, but the city fathers did not think it necessary to make advances to a totalitarian state to fill the hotels.”

Today, China’s CP is still justifying the supremacy of the Communist Party in all matters of religion in society by referring to Karl Marx. In early April 2018, for example, the Chinese government published a new White Paper on Religious Issues, emphasizing that religious matter must be subordinate to the party. Only this week, the authorities ordered the removal of a cross on a newly built church in Henan Province. The parish, which is officially registered, is not to be seen as one of the illegal underground churches.

“The Chinese regime deliberately disregards its own laws,” criticized Delius. “For example, Beijing is relying on arbitrary arrests of Chinese and foreign government critics – and, through torture, forces them to admit alleged crimes on state television. The STP is aware of at least 45 cases in which political prisoners were forced to make such ‘confessions’ since 2013. That’s state terror.”

Header Photo: Paul via Flickr