NBA player Enes Kanter Freedom slammed the United Nations human rights chief on the same day the global organization released a report on China’s human rights violations against the Uyghurs and failed to mention “genocide.”
The 48-page report found that China was guilty of detaining Uyghur Muslims at internment camps where allegations of sexual abuse and rape by Chinese officials appeared to be “credible and would in themselves amount to acts of torture or other forms of ill-treatment.”
However, despite the United States characterization of the abuse as “genocide,” the U.N. classified China’s “arbitrary and discriminatory detention” of the Uyghurs as “crimes against humanity.”
The report was released on the final day of Michelle Bachelet’s term as U.N. high commissioner, and Kanter, who has been a vocal critic of the People’s Republic of China, called her out for being an ineffective leader.
“Today was [Michelle Bachelet’s] last day on the job, the commissioner for @UNHumanRights,” he posted on Wednesday. “On her last day of her 4 year term she decided to do her job when it was too late to make a difference. You wasted all your power catering to the CCP propaganda Shame!”
The former Celtics star recently told Fox News host Laura Ingraham that the NBA is “really mad” he exposed their willingness to kowtow to China.
Kanter claimed that the NBA revolves around money and publicity stunts. “It’s been like that for years, so I’m not really surprised,” he said. “They could care less about the players, about the coaching staff and the fans as long as the league image is profitable.”
“And finally, they are really mad because someone finally from the inside who played 11 years in this league — [is] going out there and exposing them one by one. And that is unacceptable,” Kanter continued.
He said that the NBA’s willingness to pander to China “hurt” his heart. “What is unacceptable is how they can bow down to the biggest dictatorship out there in the world,” he concluded. “So that hurt my heart. I was like, “You know what? Enough is enough. Someone has to call out this hypocrisy.” And I did it.”